Metroid Integration
by BCandTheSundaceK
Summary: Metroid Integration: A Halo Cross over. Samus receives a distress signal, and goes to investigate it while she is exploring an unexplored chunk of space called the Fringe. Please R
1. Unexpected Discovery

_Bleep bleep._

A puzzled look appeared on Samus' face. If her computer was translating this correctly, that signal is a distress signal.

"This can't be right." She muttered to herself. "There is nothing out here for mega parsecs."

It was true, and in part why she was there in the first place. After the run in with the Parasite X on the Biological Space Labs, Samus had been hard up on cash.

With all the money she spent repairing and upgrading her Varia suit, so it would protect her from the cold. A side effect she would now have to deal with. Everything

comes at a cost, the ultimate immune system, based off the Metroid's DNA, had its one minor draw back. Being so low on cash, Samus was taking about any job

offered by the Galactic Federation. Even stooping so low as to scouting out new regions of space. New wouldn't be the correct term, just unexplored space. The star

density in this area was low, maybe two systems in the 60 mega parsec area she was sent to start mapping.

She only convinced herself to do the job, by holding on to the hope that there was a Space Pirate station operating out here. She new those odds would be low,

resources at the Fringe, as it was know, were rare, and with only maybe a dozen planets in the area, less than a fourth of them would have favorable harvesting

conditions for any type of supplies. The signal came from a rather small system, containing a Yellow dwarf. With all the space dust, the light was blocked.

"Well, perhaps the Fringe contains more than I had given it credit for." She mused

If more star systems were hidden as this one was, who knows what else would be lurking in the shadows.

She altered her _Hunter-_class gunship, on an intercept course for the mysterious signal. What she found was a surprise, system containing four habitable planets, as

well as some various gas giants, with promising mining outposts on their moons. But the most shocking was the ship she encountered. Or part of a ship. It was in a

degenerate orbit around a planet, one of the habitable ones. The odd thing about the ship was it was missing its front half. Stranger even was the fact that none of

it was due to weapons fire, it was simply as if never existed. Like a child cut a paper ship down the center with scissors. The cut was that uniform. The gunship slid

alongside where the front half of the ship should have been, Samus parked the gunship inside, telling the computer to keep its automated defense systems on, as

well as the engines running. She didn't know what was on the ship, and sure didn't want to stick around to meet whatever caused this damage.

Stepping on to the mystery ship, Samus noted how the place was deserted. This signal could have been going off for ages.

"Well at least on the plus side, no one will miss anything that I take." One of the perks of finding an abandon ship is the abundance of wealth one can procure in a

short period. Walking deeper into the ship, Samus picked up some strange glyphs, the likes of which she had never seen before, and nothing the Galactic Federation

had seen either. It read "_Forward Unto Dawn." _She had no idea what the characters said, but soon she would.

A small purple human appeared on one of the near by computer interfaces Samus was scrolling through.

"Can I help you?" The construct asked rudely.

"I didn't realize a ship this size could carry such a sophisticated AI program. Let alone still have it operational after whatever hit you"

The construct wasn't impressed, nor did it waste any more time with pleasantries.

"Are you all of the rescue team? Seems kind of pitiful, and I must say wow the UNSC moves fast another new MJOLNIR class armor, according to my chronometer not

that much time has passed, they must be keeping busy."

All this talk just confused Samus, what was the UNSC, what did she mean about being surprised about the early arrival?

"How did you get here so fast anyways?" She asked, interrupting Samus train of thought.

"It should have taken many years to get here using conventional hyper drive, and here you are only after 2 months, and I wasn't even getting sick of solitaire yet."

She added sarcastically.

"Sorry I don't have a clue of what you're saying, my name is Samus Aran, I am currently being employed by the Galactic Federation, I have never heard of the UNSC."

"Galactic Federation, well isn't that the cheesiest name I ever heard of. Well no use sitting here, we might as well head down to the storage bay. Seeing how you

thought it was impressive that the ship could contain me, I doubt your armor has a docking port for me" the AI sighed "I guess I'll have to walk, I'm just so used to

being carried."

Somehow that statement didn't surprise Samus.

As they wondered through the ship, Cortana would jump from terminal to terminal, while Samus followed. To break the silence eventually Samus spoke up "So are

there any others aboard the ship or is it just you?"

"Sort of," replied Cortana.

"I was planning on scavenging the ship if you don't mind, there is no way my gunship can tow thing anywhere."

"That's fine with me, though there is one item we must bring along."

Cortana never said what they had to bring along. As they opened the door to the storage bay, she could see what it was.


	2. Enter the Chief

"Is this it?" Samus asked pointing at a large coffin shaped object. "Is this your hardware?"

"Not exactly…see, I scanned you when you walked in, and you had mostly human DNA, with some sequences spliced in that I had never seen before. That along with

your armor, made me think UNSC, since no one else could afford such top of the line stuff. This caused me to miss your first comment, but after you kept talking I

realized I couldn't let you catch him undefended."

"Who..?"

"Me." Up against the back of her helmet was the shaft of a battle rifle.

"It's not that we don't trust you… Ok it is because we don't trust you that we are doing this." Cortana explained. "We don't want to hurt you, you nice enough, but I

couldn't risk you walking in and shooting up the place while he was defenseless."

Samus' eyes darted around the room, where had he come from, and more importantly how was she to escape? At this range even her armor wouldn't stand up to

blast from a power beam.

"You can put the gun down Chief, I don't think Samus means us any harm. You'll have to excuse him, men are so rude. I'm Cortana, and he is Master Chief Petty

Officer John-117 of the Spartan II program, but you can call him Master Chief."

The Master Chief surrendered his weapon, allowing Samus to turn around.

"Friends call me Chief." John said

"You don't have any friends," Laughed Cortana

Samus shook his hand, and to her surprise he didn't have a Arm Cannon, it looked like he had a projectile weapon, they were outdated years ago.

"The UNSC still uses projectile weapons? No wonder your ship was obliterated."

"Those weapons are pretty powerful, and have started to update the capital ships with the Forerunner technology. Besides we weren't attacked."

"The Damage to the ship occurred when we prematurely dropped out of a Slipstream." Master Chief explained. Samus could tell he was the reserved type, this was

the second time he said anything, either that or he was shy. "As for the weapons." he continued. He pulled the Battle rifle from his back and Shot at an I-beam,

causing it to buckle from the stress. "They get the job done."

After the pleasantries were exchanged they started to scavenge the ship. Master Chief took enough weapons to outfit a small army. Samus could tell she would like

him. Some supplies that looked like they could fetch Samus a few credits were also taken along. Cortana then loaded herself up into Master Chief's helmet port, and

they headed off to the gunship. Samus couldn't believe that a ship AI could fit inside his armor.

"Sorry about the size of my ship, it's just me here. So you'll probably hold up in the restraining cells, unless you don't require sleep." Samus explained. The ship was

about the size of a small freighter, it did serve as a temporary living quarters to Samus, but it was nothing too elaborate. It was mostly stripped down as much as

possible and the rest of the space, save her quarters, was for weapons, and storage.

"So where are you from?" asked Samus awkwardly. She was used to being alone, and the extra company she entertained usually would be locked in the holding

cells by now.

"Earth," replied the Chief. His response puzzled her, though she had never been to Earth, it was within the Galactic Federation. Unless of course by some

coincidence his home planet had the same name. "There is a star cart over there," motioned Samus, "You can pull it up if you want." The Chief walked over to the

terminal, and pulled up the map.

"That's weird!" exclaimed Cortana "its right there, but something is wrong."

Chief pointed at the location that Samus knew to be Earth. But it didn't make any sense, how could they be from there? The other thing that bothered Samus was

Cortana had said it would be years before she expected anyone. Even out at this distance of the Fringe, it would have only taken a year at tops to get to Earth.

"It's mirrored," She exclaimed "That's why I didn't know where we were, everything was wrong! It's like we were sent into a parallel universe." From there just an

outpour of information spewed from Cortana's mouth. Theories how the slip stream could have bent, ripped, or even rewrote the space-time fabric. She continued on

for what seemed like hours.

"Does she ever shut up?" Samus asked the Chief.

"No," joked the Chief, "But at least you can mute her."

It had been a long day. Samus planned on exploring at least a couple of the planets in the area before moving on to mapping out the vast nothingness. John had

gone down to the storage room to make sure his weapons were in prime condition. Samus was fine with the break from Cortana. Even so Samus was thinking that it

would be a good idea if they all got to know each other a little better. She removed her Varia suit. She wasn't going to need it for a while anyways, not that it is

uncomfortable, but it can be a hassle. As she always would say "Ever try piloting a ship with a arm cannon?" She beamed out of her armor, revealing her blue

neoprene jump suit. She flipped on the com and asked the Chief if he wanted to meet in the galley at 1200 hours. Though calling it the galley was a bit of a stretch

the little kitchenette that her ship sported was hardly enough for more than a few people. But eating would give them something to do while they discussed. The

Chief arrived at precisely 1200, Samus could tell he was a real soldier, but isn't not like he'd have an excuse for arriving fashionably late, besides this wasn't a date

or anything. Samus was surprised though that the Chief didn't remove his armor. "You always dress this nice for dinner dates?" teased Samus

"You wear that out in public," Shot back Cortana. Samus glanced down, true her flight suit wasn't really glamorous either.

"You look nice" Chief said making conversation "but where's the guy in the armor?" He teased "I thought I would be talking to him." Samus rolled her eyes.

"Seriously though, is your armor permanently bound to your body, or something?"

"No," He explained "though my body has been augmented to be better suited for it, or should I say the suit was designed with my augmentations in mind."

"What kind of augmentations?" Samus inquired

"No visible ones, just some reinforced bones, and some cybernetic applications, such as my optical implants. I just don't have anything else, plus UNSC green goes

with everything."

Chief proceeded to take off his helmet, reveling a handsome man with some grizzled stubble. His eyes had a sort of inorganic blue tint to them, not unlike her flight

suit, they must have been the implants he mentioned. They spent a majority of the meal swapping adventure stories. Only after asking about why he chose to enter

the military did she learn the horrible truth behind his childhood. She too told him about her childhood, and being raised by the Chozo. "Well that explains some of

the variant DNA you have," a surprisingly quiet Cortana said. Samus finished up with giving the Chief a tour of the ship. After that she hit the showers and went to

sleep.

"So," Cortana asked the Chief once they were alone "what do you think of her?"


	3. YD4Beta

The Chief lay down on the uncomfortable bed in the holding cell. "She sure spares no expense." He joked to Cortana. He was trying to keep his thoughts from

drifting back to what she had said earlier, about being in a parallel universe. If that were true he was sure there was no way home, unless you could find away to

replicate Forerunner tech. As much as He liked Samus, he was used to taking orders, he figured he and Cortana would join up with the GF, as soon as Samus

dropped them off there. She had said she didn't know how much longer she intended to map the area. It wasn't like she had to do it all at once. But she had said

that she wanted to explore a little of the planet YD4β which _Forward Unto Dawn_ was orbiting. The designation stood for Yellow Dwarf, the star type it orbited, 4 was

the fourth planet, and the β meant that there were two moons that orbited it. He figured he would accompany Samus if she wanted to go on the surface, not that

she really would need him. Since her weaponry and armor appeared to be more advanced than his. He wondered why she didn't destroy him when they first met.

Obviously because she thought she was dealing with her grade technology, which could propose a bit of a threat. Not that his stuff was useless, it was just not very

effective. At least on the bright side, he wouldn't have to fight Samus, not saying he wasn't able to hold his own, it would just take a lot more mind than muscle.

"Chief you can't leave a girl hanging," Cortana interrupted, "You still didn't answer my question what do you think of her."

"She's powerful," He said, "I'm glad she's on our side."

"Your no fun," She teased, "I mean it's not everyday you meet your soul mate."

"Funny, for someone who has no soul, you seem to be quite the expert, besides what makes you say that?"

"She's perfect for you; I mean the suit, the moves, basically a female version of you, only she looks better."

He shook his head and drifted off to sleep. The next day he loaded up a battle rifle, along with the SPNKR rocket launcher, and a few plasma grenades. He wanted to

maximize his usefulness on this mission, and he knew if there was trouble he'd need to have as much firepower as possible. Of course Cortana couldn't resist poking

fun at him, by the fifth compensating joke he was getting sick of it. She must have been lonely for those two months by herself. He walked to the cockpit of the

Gunship. He found Samus there at the helm, not yet in her Varia suit, which surprised him. She updated him on what the planet had to offer, which seemed to be

nothing, aside from a high concentration of metal alloys, which would suggest a base. Though she was unsure since she assumed someone would have received

_Forward Unto Dawn_'s signal. After the ship landed, the Varia suit materialized around Samus. After they exited the ship, she sent it back up into orbit, to keep it

hidden, no use in announcing we were here. They found the base with relative ease. It looked like it had been abandoned only recently.

"Space Pirates," Samus hissed. Chief knew from last night's ordeal that the Space Pirates and the Galactic Federation didn't get along. He also knew of her personal

vendetta against them. Chief undid the safety on his Battle rifle; he didn't want to be caught with his pants down. There didn't seem to be much on the inside of the

base either, even the walls were bare. Samus was rummaging through material and scanning for various items looking for a clue on why they were here. Chief

walked up to a terminal and looked down at it.

"It's at times like this you wish you could read, huh Chief." Cortana piped up

"Can you make anything of it?" He mused.

"Nope, but at least I can download it, and we can check it out later."

He toyed with the idea and after much pressuring let her go into the alien computer. He did warn that he wanted her out as fast as possible.

"I've dealt with Covenant stuff, Chief don't worry about me, I'm probably safer in here than you are." She didn't know how right she was about to be. After digging

around for a couple of minutes, the hallway in which they had come threw exploded. It sent the Chief flying across the room. He got back up and raced towards the

terminal, so Cortana could jump back into the safety of his armor.

"What did you do?" Roared Samus, as she bounded around the corner.

"She did it," he said tapping at his helmet to indicate Cortana.

"She must have tripped the automated defense system, or some sort of insurance policy that anyone who enters wont be able to leave."

"I seriously doubt that." Chief said

"And why is that?"

Instead of responding the Chief opened fire, on the large insectoid that was approaching from across the room. "It seems that this place isn't abandoned." The

moved out of the large open space, and took cover. Dozens of Space Pirates started to enter the room. The first thing the Chief noticed was that the Pirates weren't

as well armored as Samus, that Chozo tech must have been top of the line. It only took a dozen or so rounds before he could split the head of a Pirate. Growing

tired of wasting rounds the Chief lobbed a plasma grenade towards a group of them. This disemboweled over half a dozen of them. He turned towards where Samus

had been, she was charging a group of them, her suit lit up, and she smashed them like jelly against the wall. After which she dove around for cover.

"Looks like someone is used to playing alone." Chief said to Cortana

"Funny, I thought that's the way we worked." She responded.

It was the truth, but he was used to dealing with the Covenant, he wasn't sure what these Pirates had up their sleeves. On opened fire on the Chief, the power

beam hit him square in the chest. It took down half of his personal shielding. He was too close to use a grenade or rockets, and knew he wouldn't be able to take

him with the battle rifle in time. So he took note of what Samus did and charged him. Only instead smashing him into the wall, he came down on his head with the

butt of his rifle. At least something remained the same; very few things could take the strength of the Spartan coupled with the MJOLNIR suit. Chief had no delusions

of grandeur, he needed time for his suit to charge, and wouldn't last long against some many of them. He sprinted towards the near wall, and bounded off of it,

sending him up to the ceiling. He steadied himself on the rafters, almost landing on them, a whole 3 meters up. From up here he would have a slight advantage. It

didn't last too long though. With in the minute he was encircled by a dozen of the Insectoids.


	4. Separated Spartan

This is the worst, thought Master Chief. This isn't supposed to happen to me. I'm Master Chief; I'm supposed to pull the recruits out of this mess. Feeling a little

down on his pride, but not being to hubris to call for help he let out a plea for help.

"Samus!" He cried

He stared off at her, knowing she could only see her reflection in his gold plated helmet. Her arm cannon charged up, but he never saw it fire, he was engulfed by

the Insectoids. He knew she got off the shot, because he felt the explosion around him. But the shield of Insectoids was too thick for it to be effective. He felt himself

being moved away from the battle.

"Well on the bright side, they obviously don't want to kill you." Cortana said.

"Some how that really doesn't make me feel better."

He just needed to get to his side arm. But He couldn't reach the M6G that he had holstered. It wasn't as powerful as the battle rifle but at this range, and if he

stuffed the muzzle up under their jaws he knew he'd blow their minds. Literally. The swarm that engulfed him finally came to a stop and began to dissolve around

him. Leaving only a pair of them to restrain each of his arms. He was forced down on his knees. A large view screen appeared in front of him. And on it was a giant

dragon like being, who could only be Ridley.

"What is it," Ridley said furiously "I told you not to inter…. Well, well Samus, Don't think your new power suit is going to fool me, what's the matter did Parasite X

wreck your precious Varia Suit? I would sure hate it if you lost that gift from your adopted family."

One of the Insectoids tentatively shrilled a hissing answer "Skriiiii!"

"What!" Ridley roared, "Then kill it, only Samus' death do I crave to watch, you shall be punished for this interruption." His tail whipped about, showing his rage.

The brave insectoid whimpered a plea, made up of more shrills.

"What… Samus!" Ridley's voice rose at her voice. She had just appeared through the door. All the pirates shifted their gaze to Samus. That was all the distraction

Master Chief needed. With a swift motion he pulled his right hand down, with all of his might. Sending the insectoid crashing to the ground. Using this momentum his

hand slip down to his leg, and removed the Magnum. In a smooth arc he brought the gun up between the mandibles of the pirate on his left, and pulled the trigger.

The blast echoed with in the hardened carapace of the pirates head. It sent the skull flying across the room, painting it black with its thick tar like blood. No longer

were the pirates in there stupor they sprinted about to grab whatever armaments they could find.

"You idiots!" Cried Ridley "Do…."

The transmission ended abruptly as Master Chief fired a round into the viewer.

"About time, you did something about that guy, he was starting to piss me off," Applauded Cortana.

"Nice of you to show up to the party," Said Master Chief.

Leaving both Cortana and Samus wondering who he was addressing. There was nothing more satisfying to the Chief than the warmth of his fired side arm, but he

knew if he were to get out of here alive, he would need that battle rifle. As he ran for it he could see an insectoid leveling a beam cannon at her head.

"Look out!" He yelled pointing in the direction of danger.

Then to his amazement she did something he didn't expect. She dove towards the pirate. As her hands touched the ground she rolled up into an impossibly small

ball. Using the momentum from the dive she rolled under the pirate. Then the Chief noticed what appeared to be a plasma grenade right between the legs of the

unexpecting pirate. Before the pirate could even turn she was already morphed out of the ball springing into the air. In mid leap a missile roared from her arm canon

into another pirate. Half way through his turn, the glowing mine, exploded leaving a shredded pirate behind. He had to hand it to her; she had some pretty fancy

foot work. Master Chief scooped up his battle rifle and fired some rounds off into the nearest pirate. He had to admit this one went down easier than the first one he

fought. Swing his rifle onto his back he reached for the tube labeled SPNKr. Hoping the rockets were still loaded in, he swung it around and shot it at the grouping of

pirates on the far wall. The smoke cloud encircled the rockets trajectory. Slowly shielding the Chiefs eye to the coming explosion. The rocket hit in the middle of the

grouping, the face plating on the Chief's helmet darkened to shield his eyes from the blinding light. Half the grouping of pirates were just blown against the corner of

the far wall. They were beginning to stabilize themselves and take aim. Luckily for the Chief, the launcher held two rounds. He squeezed of another shot. The pirates

were expecting this one, and dove away form the missile. It hit the wall, surprisingly the entire wall was vaporized, and the back shock reverberated off the now

gone wall, knocking all the pirates to the ground.

"Wow," Cortana mused, "I guess when you can't find doors, you just make 'em huh Chief."

"I guess," agreed the Chief "Surprised his rocket did that much damage.

It wasn't until he heard the loud swooshing did he realize what had happened. Since time since the hallways implosion Samus had activated her gunship remotely,

and it had finally been able to blast its way to where they were now located.

"You coming or what," Samus taunted as she dashed by the Chief. The Gunship rotated around, no longer bearing its twin front mounted cannons. The middle of the

ship lowered giving them a primitive elevator platform to lift them back into the ship. Several high speed laser automated turrets whirred to life spewing red lances of

light, out at the pirates. The lasers kept the pirates at bay and began to engulf the compound in fire.

"Come on Chief," Samus urged, as she reached out her hand to the Chief. The Gunship had begun to climb in altitude.

"Yeah Chief, we don't wanna miss our ride." Encouraged Cortana

The Chief took a running start and bounded up clasping Samus' hand. She helped pull him on to the ship, as the Lift slowly seal back up, and the ship returned to

orbit.

"Please," the Chief started, "Call me John."


	5. Downloaded dilemma

Master Chief squeezed his 7 foot frame through the storage bay door. He had barely made it on to the ship before leaving the exploding base. Samus knew he

would be full of questions now. The base had been a small contingency force, probably just a platoon, as far as Samus could gather. It wasn't large enough for an

assault force, or even enough to defend their base, they probably were just grabbing whatever was left there earlier. It turned out that the Chief was mostly

interested in the effectiveness of his firearms. It turned out that the first wave of pirates that had captured him were shield pirate militia. Even Samus admitted they

give her a little trouble. It would take quite a few shots from her Arm Cannon to subdue them, with out the aid from her grappler. The control room didn't have

heavily armed troops; they were just run of the mill pirate troopers. Surprisingly enough it seemed that their armor was susceptible to solid projectile weapons.

Though Samus wasn't about to trade in the arm cannon, which still was superior. Samus worked her way through the gunship towards the cockpit, with the Chief in

tow. She knew she had to head back to Galactic Federation HQ. She wished she had more time to figure everything out before heading back. Just the Master Chief

situation was complicated enough to handle. That wasn't the real reason she was anxious about getting back. It was that she still hadn't paid off the GF for their

research station she had blown up. It was part of the reprimand, and the only way she was allowed to still roam the Federation, without being a fugitive. She

wanted at least some good news to bring to the Federation. All she had was some vague info about a threat from the pirates, and that they were indeed in the

Fringe. Or at lease were at one point. Her scans had all lead to dead ends; she hoped at least Cortana had found something.

"Cortana, you've been quiet, which is unusual for you, is something wrong?" Samus pondered.

"No, I was just trying to translate what I was able to download from the mainframe." Cortana responded, "Unlike _some people_ around here, I am doing something useful."

"How much of it did you get?" John asked.

"Pulh leeze," Cortana started, "The two minutes I was in there was plenty of time for me to get everything off those prehistoric circuit boards they pass as computers in this universe."

"Well if that is true, why didn't you notice the silent alarm going off?" Samus pointed out

"I… can't read the glyphs," Cortana admitted "I just copied everything, and tried to trace where any in coming or out going signals were heading."

"Did you see where Ridley was transmitting from?"

"No, I was out of the system by then. If I had been in during an active link, I would have found him no problem. I know it sounds redundant, but since I couldn't decode anything, I was pretty much blindly feeling around in there."

"Well that's a first humility from Cortana, I thought I would have been long gone before that ever happened." John teased.

"I think I can help with that," Samus said as she climbed out of her suit, revealing her slender 6'3" frame.

After integrating Cortana into her ships computer Samus set in the hyperspace quadrants for the Galactic Federation. Samus hoped that her ship's onboard

computer would help Cortana translate the text she had stored inside her. Samus would also be able to look through the entirety of what Cortana had obtained at

the base. This way while Cortana was learning to read, she might be able to uncover something. Samus knew that the chances of her uncovering something before

Cortana could translate it were slim, but any information they could send off would be useful. After all they had a good two days before they would reach Federation

Headquarters.

After a couple of hours starting at screen after screen of useless information Samus decided to head up to the cockpit and relax. She leaned back in the pilot chair,

placed on foot up on the dash, left arm dangling over the side of her seat. She sat there, with her face cupped in her right hand, intent on staying that way until

morning. Somehow she knew her moment of peace wouldn't last.

"Ahem!" coughed the Chief.

Samus lazily rolled her head to the side of her hand, looking at the helmet-less armored man.

"I left Cortana down by the ships computer," John continued, pointing at his non existent helmet. "I figured I wasn't much help down there anyways, plus I figured you could use some tea."

"Tea?" Samus asked.

"Yeah, I mean sure most people take coffee, but I can't stand the taste, and this has about the same amount of caffeine in it." John rambled on.

Samus sipped at her hot tea.

"So what have you found out?" Samus asked

"Oh a couple of things," he said leaning in closer

"Nothing to do computer I assume." Samus noted as he closed the gap between them.

"Cortana has that covered, and I figured you could use the company."

"Funny and I thought you just came up here to give me some tea."

"Just think of it as a ..." He continued their heads practically touching.

"A perk," She finished cocking her head, running her hands through his hair, lips about to lock.

"I found it!" Yelled Cortana

"huh!" Samus jumped.

"Something useful on the computer," she continued. "Come down here and I'll show you."

_Talk about timing_, thought Samus. She headed through the bowels of the ship, towards where Cortana was working. Cortana stood suspended over Chief's removed

helmet, with a grimace on her face. _No way she's peeved at me_ Samus thought, foolishly hoping that Cortana might be upset about what almost happened in the

cockpit.

"What is it?" Asked John

"I'll show you." Cortana said.

The whole room lit up in violet hologram, which slowly adjusted to the blackness of space. Cortana took them through space until they happened upon a Blue

Supergiant.

"So what," said Samus "a big star, it's not like we've never seen on of those before."

"It's not just the star," Cortana narrated "They put out some of the most energy in the universe, but that isn't what bothers me."

She orbited around to the far side of the star. An object sat there floating in the foreground. It was unlike anything Samus had ever seen.

"It looks like…" She started

"A Halo." John finished.


	6. Hyperspace Havoc

Cortana let the Chief's words hang in the air.

"I thought that at first too." Cortana said "But something is different about this one, it's not as destructive as the ones we have dealt with, and yet at the same time it is much worse."

"What can get worse than total galactic annihilation" Samus demanded.

Instead of answering Cortana continued on with the holographic presentation. The hologram zoomed out, revealing another solar system, which neighbored the

Super giant. It showed a ship exiting one of the many planets that orbited the neighbor star. Within seconds, the Halo like structure began to come alive. The ring

structure shifted slightly, and then began funneling light in from the Super giant. The light and energy of the star started to funnel around in the Halo, like water

going down a drain, the entire star started to dim. Then light sprang from the Halo, lancing out towards the planet hitting it, causing it to explode into powder.

"Holy,"

"At least that ship was able to escape before their planet was destroyed."

"Argh," Samus cried, slamming her fist into the bulkhead "Damn pirates."

"As you can see," Cortana continued, lowering the hologram as she spoke. "It's a controlled gun; not some apocalyptic bomb, so it can take out any planet you want, and leave other ones unscathed."

"What system is it located in?" The Chief demanded

"It didn't say, and there are countless Blue Super Giants out there, so that really doesn't raise our odds on finding the place. Luckily the thing has just become fully operational, and that was the final test they needed to run."

"Aside from precision aiming, is this like the Halos you had to deal with?" Samus pondered

"No," John explained. "This Halo seems to be like a lensing mechanism that focuses the power of a star onto a single point. The Halos we dealt with were self powered. This is like some kid with a giant magnifying glass, burning ants."

"Shit, only this is one messed up kid, with one hell of a lens." Samus said "That's why it's located by a Blue giant, they needed the raw out put of energy only it could provide."

"Well on the plus side, we know they only used the Fringe for R&D, No Blue giant there, no anything in there." Chief said trying to give the group some enthusiasm.

Cortana forced out a weak laugh "Chief is right, besides, I think I found a weakness."

"And what would that be," pawed Samus.

"I analyzed the data a couple times, and I think that ship leaving the planet wasn't because of evacuation. I think it was planting a targeting computer. The lens seems to have only two functions focus the energy of the star into a destructive beam, and don't get melted by the sun. It seems that the Ring, needs something to tell it where to send the energy." Cortana displayed a black cylinder, no longer than a child's arm that was riddled with gears. "Not only that, but the base we raided, it was a place to manufacture these guiders, they put out a distinct transmitting pattern, so I can track it."

"Good," John exclaimed. "But how many of them are there, we should relay this to the Galactic Federation so they can destroy those things."

"Well, I have some good news and some bad news." Cortana stated glumly. "The good news is they only made three of those things, the bad news is, I have been trying to contact the Galactic Federation for the past 10 minutes, and I don't get a signal, I think we are being jammed."

"Some Pirates must have stowed away while we escaped." Samus guessed

This just was not her day. She headed for the cockpit, to drop them out of hyperspace. They had been in hyperspace for about a day, which meant that they still

were a day away from HQ, unless of course hyperspace shifted after she dropped out of it. It was the most she could hope for, drop out, clean off the pirate scum

that was attached to their hull, and jump back in, hoping it shifted enough to shorten their trip. After all that, she could contact HQ and give them a heads up. Samus

dropped the ship out of hyperspace. She suited up in her Varia suit, and headed to the storage bay with Master Chief.

"I figure there are about two of them out there, 3 max." Samus briefed the Chief as she vented the air from the bay.

"How you figure that?"

"Cause if there are anymore … we're screwed."

Samus lowered the bay floor, and stepped out into space. She could tell that the MJOLNIR armor the Chief wore was EVA certified, but doubted they employed it

much more any extra-vehicular activity. Samus ignited the boosters on her back and floated around to the top of the gunship. Master Chief clunked along behind her

at a slower rate, using what little gravity the ship offered, in conjunction with magnetized boots to walk along the hull behind her.

"Lovely evening for a stroll," joked Cortana.

This was going to suck, there was a lot of ship to cover, and the pirates could be wedged in there anywhere. The pirates had the element of surprise, and they were

hiding on her ship, and Samus didn't know any sane person would get trigger happy shooting at their own ship. Samus floated long the hull, until she found a small

dish sized disk attached to the ship's surface. A jammer, no doubt. Using her grappler, she fired its circuits and yanked it off, she wasn't going to use her hands to

remove that, it could be wired with explosives. She tossed the jammer out into space.

"I found one," she said, explaining what to look for "there could be more out here so keep a look out." She glided along the hull a little further finding another one,

disposing it in the same manner. _There are at least two of them _she thought, turning around to give John the heads up. As she turned she could see four of them

standing behind the Chief, leveling their guns at his head.

"John," She yelled "Behind you."

She was sure he was dead; the four of them against him, the odds were bad enough as it was, with his inferior weaponry, but now they had the jump on him. She

began to charge her arm cannon, hoping she could get a shot off if he got clear. Instead, instantly after the words left her mouth, John dove off to the side, and in

mid roll, reversed his direction, so when he landed, he was facing his advisories. Then he did something unexpected he upholstered his Mangum leaving his Battle

Rifle on his back. Then he did something that made Samus mad. He took aim at her ship and fired. She knew it wouldn't do much damage, but still this was her ship,

and she didn't care how frighten he was, a soldier shouldn't have that poor of aim. The third shot set off an explosion engulfing the pirates, and sending what

remained of the out in to space.

"Not too bad," The Chief smirked behind his helmet.

"What the hell are you doing, shooting up my ship?" Samus yelled

"Hey I just saved our lives back their, 4 pirates, one jammer, I would call that 2 birds with one stone." John said defending his actions.

"Yeah, I know just be careful, wrecking a girl's ship doesn't win you any points." She said "And hero…" She continued "Clean off the last jammer before you head inside."

With that she headed inside to plot the hyperspace jump.

"Yeah, good going hero." Cortana said sarcastically

"Shut up."


	7. The Long Trip Home

Samus flew back into the storage bay of her Hunter-class ship

Samus flew back into the storage bay of her _Hunter-_class ship. She went over to the airlock, listened to it depressurize, and then stepped back into the ship. She

waited for the air to rush back in. Now with a viable atmosphere, she could hear the servos of her suit whir as she walked through the ship. It had never been much

of a looker on the inside, with just its unadorned gunship gray interior. She headed over to the Navi-computer to initialize the hyperdrive sequence. The display

powered up, revealing a 3-D pattern of a green grid. The grid was displaying only two dimensions, the X and Y axis, as the computer continued to load, the gird

started to grow in the Z direction, making a wired cube structure. The galaxy began to appear inside the grid, there was an orange blinking dot, that indicated where

she was now located. She selected the star system which held the Galactic Federations Headquarters, and waited for the cfomputer to plot the hyperspace jump. The

computer was sluggish, it was the second consecutive hyperspace jump it had to do. This is hard on the computer, usually after a jump, it get some routine

maintenance to insure safety of the next jump.

Samus raised her left hand up to the side of her helmet.

"John," She crackled over the comm. "Are you done yet."

"Almost, I am just trying to remove the last jammer with out setting it off, give me another five minutes."

"Just hurry, the sooner that it is removed, the faster the Navi-computer will be able to calculate the next jump, and it is having enough trouble as is."

A few minutes later the Chief contacted Samus, to let her know she could seal the storage bay. With out the added interference of the jammer, the Navi-computer

was able to finish the calculation in no time. Luckily hyperspace had shifted in their favor. It still, however, wasn't drastic enough to take too much time off the trip.

Samus headed over to the comm. to contract the GF.

"I wouldn't do that." Advised Cortana

"We won't get there in time, we need to warn them." Samus explained.

"If we do that, we risk the pirates intercepting our transmission, and changing the transmission sequence of the targeting cylinders. Besides, I was going over the data again, and it seems that the Ring has quite the extensive cool down sequence. The test they ran was fairly recent. I assume they still want to verify the data they obtained, and they have at least a 12 hour cool down period, in which the Ring can't fire again."

"So how much time does this give us?" Samus asked

"Optimistically a few days. Pessimistically, 12 hours after they did their final test. I would say we probably have a few days, since placing such a device on a planet risks discovery, I assume they only will plant the device when they are ready to fire. So we probably have some time before they arrive on planet side and activate it. We might even beat them there."

"The pirates don't know we know anything, all they know is we discovered an outpost in the Fringe." John said.

"They'll expect us to at least relay that much information to the GF, so I say we do that, and on planet side we set up a meeting, with the Admiral."

Samus headed radioed the Galactic Federation and told them just of the discovery of an outpost in the Fringe, leaving out the details of the Master Chief, and the

Ring, as they now began to call the lensing device. After the communiqué was done, she activated the hyperdrive. They still had 8 hours until they arrived at the GF

HQ, Samus was going to that time to catch up on sleep.

She waited for sleep to take over, but it seemed to take forever before she fell asleep, and when she did it was anything but comforting. Her mind drifted back to

that fateful day on K2-L. She was out playing in the woods when the attack came. She didn't remember much, just fire and smoke and death. She cried, she wailed

for her mom, but she never came. There was someone to answer her plea. A giant dragon like entity swooped down, landing in front of her. "Ah, the great hunter

Samus Aran," He mocked.

"Not so tough without your Varia armor are you." He Sneered

He reared up, and let out a triumphant bellow. The young Samus started to run away. Ridley's head reared up, and snapped down, catching her by the ankle. Then

like a giant sea bird, he tossed her into the air. She screamed all the way down, but the noise soon was silenced as he caught her in his mouth.

"Samus!" The Chief cried, again, shaking her more vigorously, "Wake up!"

Samus' eyes snapped open, instinctively her hand went for the blade under her bed. She drove it as hard as she could into the neck of the Master Chief. If he hadn't

been wearing his armor, he would have been decapitated.

"Whoa," He cried backing off "You were having a nightmare, its ok now."

Unsure if he was reassuring her or himself.

"Have we dropped out of hyperspace?" Samus asked nonchalantly.

"No we still have a few hours."

"I'll be in the cockpit if you need me." Samus said as she walked out of her quarters. Her back was soaked with sweat, she took a detour towards the shower first.

After a few minutes of sitting under the steaming shower head, she reluctantly headed towards the captains chair. Slumping down in the chair she thought to herself

_It wont happen again, I won't allow it too._ She would stop Ridley form deploying the Ring's destructive power, or so help her, she would die trying.

John took the hint that Samus didn't want to be bothered, it wasn't too hard to figure out though. Not many people try and stab you when you wake them up. He

avoided her until they dropped out of hyperspace. They dropped out a few light seconds from the capital planet of the Galactic Federation. They wouldn't be setting

down on the planet side as previously thought. Samus was able to gain an audience with the Admiral, so they were just going to dock with his capital ship GFS _Olympus_.

"This should be easy," Samus explained "compared with what we've been through, convincing the Admiral I am not insane should be a walk in the park."

"I'm not so sure you could convince me." Cortana muttered under her breath.


	8. GFS Olympus

The _Hunter_-class ship was flanked by two _Thialfi-_class interceptors. Their rectangular shapes seemed crude in comparison to the Varian helmet-inspired craft that

Samus piloted. Two of the four whisker-like forward cannons of GFS _Hermes_ leveled themselves at Samus' cockpit; the same procedure was duplicated by_ Hermes _

counterpart the GFS _Garrick. _The two larger ships positioned themselves abreast to the _Hunter_, lining up the more tapered rectangular bridges up with Samus' ship.

"This is Commander Jordan of the GFS _Garrick_, requesting a reduction of your thrust by 70. Please follow us to docking bay 94 Ms Aran."

"Roger, over and out."

The Chief could finally see the silhouette of the _Olympus_ as she crept around the planet she was orbiting. She was much larger than the _Pillar of Autumn_, and wasn't

as uninspired in design as the _Pillar_ or the _Thialfi_-class ships that he had encountered so far. The ships weren't organic in nature either, as the Covenant ships had

been, but she was large. She was over 2000m, the overall design was like an elongated cylinder, with a bulbous protrusion, the Chief could only guess as the

command bridge. A long right triangle-esque frill whose hypotenuse draped below the chin of the bridge adorned the exterior of the ship. The frill was almost as

deep as the ship was long, giving the _Olympus_ an almost gun-like appearance.

The _Hunter_ slid into docking bay 94, which was located where the longer of the two legs of the frill met with the body of the ship. Samus stood up form the pilot's

chair and told her ships computer to proceed with the landing procedure. She led the Chief down to the storage bay. As she started opening the bays ramp, she told

the Chief to follow her, and keep quiet.

"Ms Aran, a pleasure to have you aboard, as usual." The synthesized feminine voice of Aurora Unit 242 said, "Fleet Admiral Caster Dane, is busy on the bridge, and would prefer if he could meet you in the privacy of his fleet briefing room. Do you remember where it is located?"

"I believe so 242," Samus answered.

"Very well then, I will inform the Admiral of your arrival."

After the holographic image of 242 faded away, the Chief spoke up "Finally a computer who can give Cortana a run for her money."

"I doubt it," Sneered Cortana. "Just because she is some errand girl on a cruiser doesn't mean she is smarter than me."

"I wouldn't be too hard on her," Samus stated. "She is an organic super computer, one of the most advanced in the galaxy. She is very similar to the Space Pirate commander Mother Brain, who was a prototype for the Aurora Unit series. And Mother Brain has evaded us for many years."

"Yeah, that doesn't seem so hard to do," Cortana muttered under her breath.

As they wandered through the ship to the Fleet's briefing room, the chief saw many uniformed sailors, as well as what he believed to be the GF Marines, that Samus

had described to him. Their armor seemed to be inspired by the Varian armor Samus wore, theirs was an unadorned white armor with a smaller arm cannon, which

allowed for more dexterity of both hands. The SPARTAN knew he stood out against the sanitized futuristic look of the GF sailors, with his war torn olive MJOLNIR

armor, but no one approached him. _Must be because Samus has me in tow_ he figured. Even outside her iconic Varia armor, Samus was respected by all onboard the

ship. This surprised Master Chief, how someone operating outside the military commanded such command in this ship. He was sure they feared and respected her

more than the towering SPARTAN that walked alongside her. He glanced down at her and asked "Is there anyone here who doesn't know who you are? They seem

to recognize you even outside your armor."

She nodded, "most people have heard of me inside the Galactic Federation, but few know me apart from my Varia suit."

She turned a corner, placing her hand on a green pad. A light ran down the green rectangle, scanning her identifying characteristics, such as fingerprints and DNA. A

red circle opened up at eye level, Samus leaned in, spoke her name, and yet another scan was completed, opening the door in which Samus stood in front of. 

_Security here is tight_ though John _I wonder_…

"When I was 18 I left Zebes, the current home planet of the Space Pirates, also my surrogate home planet that the Chozo raised me on. They had given me the Varia suit and trained me in their ways, as well as to be a fighter." Samus started interrupting the Chief's thoughts.

They headed inside the briefing room, and she took a seat on the grey plastic briefing chairs, all of which had plush navy blue cushions to support the senior sailors.

They obviously spared no expense.

"I thought joining the Galactic Federation Marine Corps, would be the best way to make a difference," She continued. "I was assigned here for basic training, under

Dane, when he still was a captain. He took upon himself to act as a father figure to me, I didn't need him to be, but it was nice to have a higher up looking out for

me. After I finished basic, I begged Dane to assign me to an active squad. He gave me Adam Malkovich, the best CO in the marines at the time. He had a zero

percent fail rate, with some of the lowest causalities in the Corp. Dane thought that along with my advanced armor, I would be the safest there."

John wandered over to the water cooler to dispense himself a drink, the gold plated visor of his helmet retracted allowing for him to ingest the drink. He walked over

to the observation window and watching the fleets ships move about as he listened to Samus' story.

"Adam, was a good CO, and a good friend… We had a couple of missions under our belts and were given a priority mission; we were to evacuate a governor's family

from a colony under Pirate attack. The main fleet couldn't respond to such a small task. We arrived at the mansion to find a ground force encroaching on the position.

We succeeded in evacuation most of the family. We barely made it out of there, I almost died. The Fleet didn't provide us with enough transports, or space support.

Adam through my injured body aboard one of the transports, and bought us the necessary escape time with his life. I was badly injured I should have stayed behind

and bought him that time, but he wanted to keep his perfect record… Shortly after that I left the Marines, I didn't want to have that happen again, all of the

executive decisions, the hierarchy, the expendability, so I went into the private sector. I work mostly for the Federation, but I get to choose my missions."

The Chief took in all of her story, letting what she said resonate through him; it was Cortana who broke the silence.

"Isn't Adam the name of your ships computer?"

"Yes, it is actually a stored memory of him; it isn't a perfect recreation, but I trust him with my life, that's why he is able to pilot the ship himself even in complex combat situations."

Before anything more could be said, the door slid open and in walked the Fleet Admiral

"Samus," He boomed. Walking over to embrace Samus, "And who's this, a body guard?" He asked indicating the Chief, "Are you getting soft in your old age?" He teased.

"Well it's a long story" She began.


	9. Mutiny on the Bounty

Samus decided not to waste more precious time by recounting why Master Chief had appeared, instead she told the Admiral about the Ring.

"Jesus," Dane said. "Do you know what they would be targeting?"

"Not really, could be anything from populated planets to military installations." Samus said.

Chief finally spoke up. "Once we have a target, we should be able to narrow down the systems containing the Ring. They don't want to be shooting from too far

away; the energy would diffuse the farther the distance. Effectiveness of the weapon would also be compromised by objects getting in the way of the blast; this

should also limit the range of the weapon."

"How far do you think its range would be?" The Admiral inquired

"800 light years at the most," Cortana hypothesized.

"Who said that?" the Admiral asked looking to see if anyone was behind the Chief. That was when they decided it would be a good idea to inform the Admiral where

the Chief fit into the story. The rest of the meeting with without too much excitement, several more of the senior crew joined up to be briefed on the newest threat

from the Space Pirates. The Chief was also assured that top scientists would look into his predicament. Dane decided that he would rendezvous with the main battle

fleet around Norion, that way they could spread the word of the news more securely. The Flagship would be there in no time. And since time was a factor he

requested Samus stay on the ship. Eventually the briefing room was cleared out leaving just the Chief, Cortana and Samus alone.

"Well at least this place is roomier than that thing you pass off for a ship." John noted.

"Somehow I doubt you'll be staying in the Admiral's quarters, you'll probably find the rest of the accommodations just as pleasant as aboard my ship."

"What do you mean, 'you'll', are you saying you'll get to bunk there?"

"Duh, Chief, or weren't you paying attention to her story." Cortana rolled her nonexistent eyes.

They used the rest of the time to wander the ship, before deciding to hit up the rec room for some entertainment. Cortana informed John that she had finally

debugged his helmet and now his active radar should be working. "I am tired of you getting snuck up on, like in the base, and again of the ship." She complained.

"Hey," He defended himself, "that last one was intentional, I planned that."

"Right, if by planned you mean lucked out."

"I do believe she's right, after all I did point out there position to you." Samus agreed.

"Whatever," he said.

"Care to settle this with a game of darts?" he challenged.

After a few rounds of pool and darts, they headed towards the bar to relax. It didn't last; John didn't even make it to his stool before Cortana screamed in his ear.

"This can't be right!" She cried.

"Look, I won that game fair and square, you were wrong." John explained for the tenth time.

"No! It's not that," She hissed. "It's the targeting cylinder, one of them has become active. And you'll never guess where it is."

"It doesn't matter if it is on the ship." Samus kept saying. "It'll never be able to hit us in hyperspace, let alone detect the signal."

"I don't think they are targeting the ship, I think they are targeting Norion. After all that is where the main fleet is housed. The probably want to take it out in one

shot. The pirate probably just got antsy." Cortana speculated.

"Security is pretty tight; I don't think a Space Pirate could have gotten on the ship, let alone, with one of the targeting cylinders." John let his implication hang.

"I don't like the idea of a traitor being on board, but it makes sense. This is the GF's Flagship, so it would eventually return to Norion, it would just be a matter of time."

They raced through the ships innards, anyone could be the traitor, and they couldn't trust anyone. All they could do is trace the signal to the source of the cylinder,

and hope Cortana could disarm it before, they dropped out of hyperspace. They followed the signal to a maintenance room. It was cramped back there, filled with

piping and diagnostic equipment. John went in first looking around scanning for the traitors, seeing if they were foolish enough to stay behind. It didn't appear so, he

moved deeper into the room, looking for the cylinder. He saw it wedged into some piping. He stuck his hands back into the piping jarring the cylinder free. He glanced

back at the entrance to see if Samus was still there, she wasn't. _I didn't give the all clear signal, she shouldn't have moved in_ he thought. Cursing he pulled the cylinder

out of the dense piping structure.

"I would put that back if I were you." A voice suggested

"Good thing I fixed your radar," Cortana said dryly.

The Chief made like he was putting the cylinder back. Instead he stood up quickly and backhanded the man standing behind him. Flinging him in one direction, and

sending his weapon in another. He walked towards the downed sailor, his backhand sent him across the room, slamming him into the wall. Chief bent down and

scanned him to see if he was still alive.

"Yeah, he's alive" Cortana confirmed

"But you won't be, if you move." A voice threatened.

_How many of them are there!_ He thought to himself. He couldn't locate this one; he was going to need a serious plan if he was to get himself out of this one, either

that or a steak of good luck. If he were sure of anything, it was that he was lucky. A blue blur appeared out of the corner of his eye. In one swift movement Samus

appeared out of no where, unholstered the Chief's magnum, and rolled over his back. While doing all of this she also squeezed of a round sending it into the hand of

the second assailant. Actually she only got a ricochet off his gun, causing him to drop the gun. She leaned in close to the SPARTAN's helmet and whispered "If you

weren't being such a sissy, I'd have let you take care of him. His gun wouldn't have downed you from this range."

"I'll try to remember that, the next time I volunteer you to be my human shield." He said brushing off the insult.

Leaping up to the scaffolding in which the would be shooter sat, wounded cradling his hand. John dropped the sailor down at Samus' feet. "Don't kill me!" He

pleaded hoping she would train the Chief's Magnum elsewhere.

"What are you doing, and why are you working for the pirates?" Demanded Samus.

"They kidnapped my brother's family." Whimpered the sailor, indicating his incapacitated sibling.

"They told him if he ever wanted to see the again to plant this on the _Olympus_ and activate it when she docked at Norion. I inspected it, after he told me, it was just a transmitter. It wasn't a bomb; we figured they wanted to know the _Olympus'_ maintenance schedule or something. We would have told someone about the transmitter after his family was released, and then we would change the schedule, no harm done."

Samus' face grew hard, "Your family is already dead."

She turned around and walked away, leaving just him and the Chief. The Chief grabbed both of the sailors and carried them out of the room, where he surrendered

them into the custody of some MPs. The Chief headed back towards Samus' temporary quarters along with the cylinder, which Cortana had managed to shut down.


	10. Admiral's Quarters

Samus stormed down the hallway, out of the maintenance room. Her blonde ponytail flapping like a flag in a wind storm. She was so mad, she didn't even notice she

still was carrying John's Magnum. She relaxed her arm, loosening up on the grip of the gun, her knuckles were bleached white. As she unstiffened her arm she could

feel the blood and color flowing back into it. After she calmed down a little she safetyed the gun. Those two crewmen angered her, they were so green. They

obviously knew nothing about the Space Pirates, boys with delusions of grandeur, boating around on starships saving the galaxy being a hero, just a load of crap.

Their family was dead, or soon to be, the pirates had no intentions of ever giving them back. They would just keepf them alive as long as they thought they remained

useful.The crewmen were only doing what they thought was right; after all, wouldn't she do the same thing in their situation? Risk everything to save her family. She

stopped drudging down the hall, she turned back hoping to see Master Chief behind her. No such luck, all she had to keep her company was her anger. It had

served her well so far; no need to go changing things that weren't broke.

She entered the Admirals quarters, and walked into the living room. The plush carpet was springy under her feet. She slumped herself on the large leather sofa,

gingerly tossing the now harmless Magnum over to the far cushion. She took in the sights of her new home for the night. The living room alone was bigger than an

ensigns room, she never understood why the Admiral received so much room, he hardly was ever there, usually at the bridge or the briefing room, where he often

slept. The room was a light blue, not to different from her zero suit. The room featured no sharp corners; everything was tapered, giving it a calming effect. She felt

the rooms effects, her heart rate slowed, her teeth were no longer gritted, her brow unfurrowed. A melody sounded from the door, indicating that someone had

arrived. It had to be the Chief, since Dane would have been able to enter.

"Come in" She said

Her voice command undid the locking mechanisms of the door, allowing it to open. The hulking figure of the armored Master Chief stepped in.

"I wanted to tell you that Cortana was able to disengage the transmitter." He said, producing the cylinder. He walked over towards Samus, placing the cylinder

upright on the coffee table.

"I also came to get my gun," He added, "I like that gun."

Samus lazily pointed at where she had tossed it earlier. After holstering the firearm, he began to ask her about the Ring.

"Now that we know of one of there targets, does it bring to mind any other ideas?" He asked

"It seems they are targeting the military aspects of the Galactic Federation, if they take out its largest Starport, at Norion it would deal a serious blow to our

defenses. We wouldn't be entirely defenseless though, if they were trying to minimize resistance on a full out hostile take over they would be wise to target the

Shipyards of Aliehs III."

"I was hoping you'd have an idea, this way Cortana could triangulate a firing position of the Ring."

"I think I could do one better Chief," Cortana stated. "I think I found the dialing code of the cylinder, when we drop out of hyperspace, I can trace it to its intended star system."

The Chief stood up and moved slightly to the door. "Good," he stated.

"Oh, and Samus, if you ever need anyone to talk to, I'm here." He said feeling stupid. Her ice cold blue eyes looked up trying to make contact with the ones he concealed behind the gold plating of his helmet. "I know," she said, "but it is always good to hear it out loud." John crossed over into the Admirals wash room.

"Well for a barbarian, you're not completely inept with understanding women." Cortana applauded.

"Yeah, you pick up on a few things, when you have one stuck in your head for a couple of years." He pointed out "But it comes with its down sides, like the never ending monologues about petty things."

"What petty things!" Cortana demanded "I'm not petty. Tell me what you're talking about."

He just chuckled; he didn't need to prove his point she just did. He headed off to the shower, he grabbed some of the Admiral's civilian clothing, he was sure none of

it would fit, but he figured this would be the only chance of getting out of his armor for a while. A swoosh of compressed air spilled out of the crack that appeared in

the seal of the MJOLNIR armor. The suit broke down into its five compartments, the torso, and the appendages. Pulling off the torso section, feeling the sticky gel

layer peel from his skin. He looked down and noted the newly injured areas of his upper body. Several orange stains indicated where the medical gel had sealed up

wounds on his body. He peeled off the gel and tossed them into the trash. It was truly amazing gel, it healed up wounds with almost no scarring, and in fact it was

because of that same gel that John's body didn't look like Swiss cheese from all the skeletal augmentations. He removed the rest of the armor, noting the dank smell

that rose into his vestibules.

"God" coughed Cortana "I don't think you could have lasted much longer in that suit with out becoming persevered indefinitely."

"What are you whining about, you can't smell me."

"No, but I have the atmospheric composition sensors. And they are not giving me pretty readings." She teased.

The Chief spent the next fifteen minutes scrubbing off the grime and grit off his muscular body. He flexed his arm as he ran the soap along them, revealing the thick

cords of muscle that lay hidden beneath his skin. He paid special attention to that sticky gel layer, which seemed to get everywhere. He placed the rest of the

disassembled MJOLNIR armor into the bathroom, if the GF was anything like the UNSC, the Admiral wouldn't be here anytime soon, especially with such a high alert.

As well as dealing with those two crewmen. He asked Aurora Unit 242 to ventilate the room, so that by morning the suit would no longer be hazardous to life forms. He

placed the helmet on his head.

"Cortana, will you be ok, here for the night?" He asked her, "Or would you like me to connect you to the _Olympus'_ mainframe?"

"Well as much as I hate intruding on strange programming, I guess I wouldn't mind the company, plus I can finally prove once and for all I am the superior AI on this ship."

"Let me know how your display of mental feats goes tomorrow." He said as he hooked up the adaptor to his helmet. The Chief put on some lounging clothes, which

were too short by a couple of inches. The T-shirt he worn fit pretty well, the Admiral must have been a little soft around the middle.

The Chief wandered out into the living room. He noticed that Samus was still there sitting at the edge of sofa, sitting on her hands looking at the floor, when see

heard him enter the room, her eyes darted up at John. He could tell that she wanted to talk about something. It turned out he was wrong, it seemed he still had

something to learn about women. It turns out all she wanted was to be held. He lay down with her on the oversized sofa, wrapped in a blanket. He breathed in the

sweet scent of her blonde hair, and held her tight until they both fell asleep.


	11. Dane's Decision

"Samus," The cold feminine voice of Aurora Unit 242 began. "Samus, are you awake?"

"Huh..?" the bounty hunter let out a mummer. What did that organic computer want at this hour, whatever hour it may be.

"Admiral Castor Dane wishes you to inform you that we have dropped out of hyperspace and have arrived in the Norion system. We should arrive at the planet at 0700."

"242?" Samus asked, "What time is it now?"

"It is approximately 05:11:38 standard Galactic Federation time." She informed Samus Cheerfully. Apparently they programmed all computers to be morning people.

"Could you wake me up at 0630?" She asked politely. Samus rolled over and buried her face in Master Chief's muscular chest, and was fast asleep before she could

her 242's reply.

Another wake up call was issued for Samus precisely at 0630, she found the blanket in a cluttered mess by her feet, and John now where insight. Obviously the

SPARTAN had no bedside manner, leaving her exposed to the elements like that. She was about to exchange words with the non-visible soldier, when the scent of

bacon and maple syrup entered the room. _Well _she thought as she went off to join him for breakfast _maybe I'll let him off easy this time._

After the meal of warm crisp waffles, Samus had to endure a constant reenactment of the many games of chess and various other games that Cortana had played

against 242. The way it sounded was that Cortana had won the battle of wits, but not by a wide margin.

"She'll probably be telling you how she had other tasks to attend to." Cortana explained "that is why she lost. I beg to differ, she had menial duties to attend to

such as priority alarm calls for certain sailors, and that was about it, I mean the ship was in Hyperspace, she didn't have anything to do, but run maintenance scans,

and those were probably optional." Cortana continued to drone on and on about the events of last night. Samus was able to convince the Chief to leave his gear in

the Admiral quarters, until after they met with him. She didn't think she could stand much more of her voice at this time in the morning.

They headed over to the droplift to take them up to the bridge. The Admirals quarters were located on the frill of the ship. The quarters took up a whole level of the

frill, which is why they had been so extensive. True enough his quarters were located near the bottom of the frill, but it really didn't matter a floor was a floor. After 2

minutes the droplift finally reached the bridge. The thick blast doors hissed opened revealing the bridge in a blinding light. Samus stepped out onto the bridge; her

quick glance around revealed that there was only a skeleton crew operating the bridge this morning. It was probably partially had to do with it being so early in the

morning, and mostly because of the severity of the situation. Samus also noted that most of the present crew was senior staff. She and John headed over toward

Castor.

"Nice of you to join us this morning." The Admiral said keeping his back to the new arrivals. He had one hand placed on the railing surrounding the giant view port

which he gazed out of. In the other hand he scrolled through his pocket interface, checking the current status of the ship. Out of the ship was a magnificent view.

Dozens of ships filled the viewing port. Capital ships glided by like majestic whales, while the smaller supply ships darted between these metallic behemoths. The

Admiral followed Master Chief's gaze towards several transports, containing large chunks of an unassembled station.

"Samus' little donation to our illustrious Federation. It is to be the new Biologic Space Labs for SR-388. It's being several of the parts were constructed here at Norion, and are being sent there for assembly."

The Chief nodded acknowledging what the Admiral had said.

"Well I hope he didn't have anything to do with you being tardy, Ms Aran." Dane continued, indicating the unarmored SPARTAN. "We have much to discuss." Admiral Dane headed towards his padded captain's chair. "Like the location of the Ring."

He seated himself in his chair, crossing his leg over his knee. He brought his hands together forming a finger teepee, and let it rest upon his lips. "Where is the cylinder?" He continued. His eyes started intently at Samus waiting for her response.

"We wanted to talk to you about that," Samus began. "We left it in your quarters for the time being. We have more important matters to discuss."

"I most certainly doubt that."

"We believe we have deciphered the Pirate's plan of attack. They intend on removing the Galactic Federation's military, thus allowing them free reign in the galaxy.

Individual planets will be no match for their combined firepower and they could pillage whatever they desired, who knows they may even become more organized

and conglomerate into a Galactic Empire," Samus explained. "Which brings us to our next point in order to do that; they would have to take out more than just

Norion. We think they would have to take out our reserve fleet, and the ships under construction at Aliehs III. We want the _Olympus_ to go to Aliehs III and retrieve

the second cylinder."

"That is preposterous, we don't even know if it is there! We can't go risking that chance; it could be anywhere including populated planets."

Master Chief finally entered the conversation, "That is why we haven't traced the source yet. We didn't think you would like our plan. If we have Cortana trace the

source, what'll you do, send the whole Norion Armada after the Ring?"

The Admiral remained silent, his eyes glaring at the super solider, his eyes shifted to Samus, wondering what she was thinking.

"If you do that, the Pirate's will surely notice you bearing down on their position and fire the Ring at the remaining target," John continued. John could tell that Dane

didn't like where the plan was going so far, but Dane knew their options were limited.

"What do you have in mind?" He said defeated, head sliding into his hand, hiding his frustration.

"We think, an Armada might be noticed; but a small, one man fighter, or perhaps a single gunship, could slip by their defenses undetected," Samus explained. "While

we go to shut down the Ring locally, you investigate Aliehs III."

Dane sighed; he knew he wouldn't like the plan, from the moment they stepped off the droplift.

They entered the Admiral's quarters, and were greeted by an exuberant Cortana

"So did you get Daddy's approval, or is this elopement not going to be traditional?"


	12. Rito's Ring

"It is an entirely appropriate word to describe the situation," Cortana continued, as John suited up in the Mark IV MJOLNIR armor.

"Elope: to leave with out permission or notification; escape. It's the third definition."

"So you're saying there was no hidden subtext, to go along with your word choice. The first two definitions wouldn't have anything to do with you choosing it to express our current situation."

"No," she said, with a hint of sarcasm, "purely coincidental."

"Right."

Master Chief inserted his foot into the open leg section of the armor. He brought down the ball of his foot into the gel layer, activating it. The open shoe and leg

extension clicked into place and began to seal up. The process came to a hissing halt where the armor ended at the knee. In three more minutes he had finished the

process and he was sealed inside the protective armor. He walked over to the coffee table and grabbed the ominous cylinder. He headed towards docking bay 94,

Samus would be there waiting for him, she left ahead of time to go through the check out procedures of their departure. A transport cart arrived to take the Chief

across the capital ship, towards the hanger's dropshafts. As he entered bay 94 he could see Samus hashing out the last minute details with the flight controller. The

Chief decided to avoid coming into the situation, but Samus signaled for him to walk over.

"It's going to take a while for me to cut through all this bureaucratic red tape," She said handing him a list. "Go aboard and start its initiating sequences. I want to leave as soon as possible, by the time I am done here, you should have her all ready to go."

The Chief took the note, and punched in the four digit code to unlock the clamp on the _Hunter_. 1701 the green iridescent number read, as they reflected off his gold face plate.

"Good morning, Chief." Adam greeted, as the Chief crossed the threshold into the _Hunter_.

"Adam, I need you to run ship diagnostics, and begin the start up sequence."

With in a couple of minutes Samus entered the ship. The _Hunter_, was escorted out of the docking bay, by two _Jahar_-class fighters. They were a rather aggressive looking fighter, looking like a capital 'Y' with their swept back wings, and tapered endings, but instead of two swept back wings they had four. The fighters escorted the _Hunter_ 3 klicks from _Olympus._

"_Hunter_," crackled the comm. "We have reached the minimum safe distance, please stand by until jump is complete, Jackson out." They two _Jahars_ split from the

formation and headed back to the _Olympus_. It was part of the deal they arranged, Cortana wouldn't even trace the signal until after they left _Olympus._ After their

departure, they would wait until _Olympus_ made the jump into hyperspace towards Aliehs III, and then they would plot their own jump. They had to be at a distance

of at least 3 klicks, to avoid the concussion wave produced by the jump into hyperspace. After the _Olympus_ made the jump Cortana began running tracking programs

on the cylinder. After a few moments Cortana had Adam pull up the star map from the Navi-computer. The holographic image of the galaxy floated between the

seasoned warriors. A small red crosshair appeared on the map. The crosshairs centered on an arm of the spiral galaxy. The box magnified several times before

centering on the Rito system. The cylinder was transmitting coordinates to an object located a few thousand miles above the surface of the Blue Giant star. The

system was pretty desolate, it had a single terrestrial planet, it was barren, too much energy radiated from the sun to support life there. There was only one

companion planet a large Jovian type with several moons. If the Space Pirates were operating within the Rito system it would have to be done in one of three

places, a space station, the terrestrial planet, or one of the moons of the Jovian planet.

"We'll have to jump to the far side of Rito, if we are to avoid detection by any ground based command centers." Cortana stated. "Luckily for us, the planets both seem to be in a Heliosynchronous orbit, so we will use the radiation of Rito, to shield our arrival."

"Shall I make a jump calculation for the Umbra of Rito?" Adam inquired.

"Yes," Samus said, "it should cover the concussion wave we'll make when we drop out of hyperspace."

"And hide the ships signature." Master Chief continued.

"Adam," Samus announced, "Start up the calculations for the jump." She walked over to the chair, strapping the three belt restraining system across herself. Locking

each of the belts into the triangle shaped buckle that rested upon her torso. The belts hung slack as she fastened her two shoulder harness in place, lastly attaching

the restraint that came up between her legs.

"You'd better get down to the holding cell, before we jump." Samus suggested to the Chief, as the belts adjusted to secure their pilot in place. He had already

started towards the cell, which had been his room during this strange adventure. He reached the cell, and sat himself down upon the unadorned chair. Within

moments of acknowledging his weight, the chair seemed to come alive. The edges flowed, like quicksilver. The cool liquid metal ran up his MJOLNIR armor, securing

him to the chair. A 'X' pattern of metal solidified itself across his chest. The Chief shifted his weight, the restraints were pretty unforgiving.

"Hang tight," Samus called over the intercom. "We're making the jump now."

"Don't worry I'm not going anywhere." Mumbled the SPARTAN to no one in particular.

"Hey it beats standing" Cortana suggested, as the acceleration shock blasted them into the reality known as hyperspace.

Within less than twelve hours, the Master Chief found himself again in the unforgiving death lock of the prisoner's chair. Only this time they were waiting for the jar

that would drop the _Hunter_ out of hyperspace. After the jar, the restrains rolled back into the chair, and John headed up towards the cockpit, where he found Samus

going over scans of the system.

"Well the good news is I don't see any of the Pirate armada hanging around here." Samus said to the approaching figure. "Wait, that can't be right, Adam, run that bio-scan again."

"Shall I run a narrower scan, perhaps just across the barren planetoid?"

"Yes, yes that's fine." She urged, waiting for the scans to refresh.

"No, that can't be right," She repeated.

"What troubles you lady?" Adam asked

"They're human ..."


	13. Metroid Madness

"I'm saying that there are humans on that terrestrial planet." Samus explained. "The scans confirmed it both times."

"More traitors?" The Chief enquired.

"No, that doesn't make any sense; the pirates for the most part are Insectoids, who hate humans."

"So the humans are probably hostages."

Samus didn't respond right away, her mind drifted back to the two crewmen. Could these Terran life signatures be their family?

"Possibly, but we don't want to go around alerting the pirates to our presence by attacking their base." Samus said harshly.

She wanted to save them; it was why she started fighting the Pirates in the first place, so no one else would ever be hurt by them. It was why the Chozo gave her the Varian armor, they knew she had a pure heart and would use it for good. She also knew if she wasn't harsh all they would do is cause more deaths, and more suffering. Like all those people whose families work at the Aliehs III shipyards. No, she wouldn't risk endangering more lives.

"No _we_ don't" The Chief agreed, "That's why I'll go in alone."

"Whoa, Chief, I like you I do, but I have to agree with Samus on this one, and you know that is a rare thing." Cortana pointed out. "But we will compromise the mission if you're caught, and they are bound to notice a few prisoners missing."

"Look we have gone over the Ring's schematics; it is just a platform for focusing the Stars energy. It won't take both of us to sabotage it."

"Yes but we don't know long it takes to initiate the firing sequence." Samus said, "They could even shut it down."

"True enough, but we know that the Ring is controlled planet side. Therefore we need to go down there anyways to make sure our plan goes off with out a hitch. I will go down their with Cortana, she will make sure no one can shut down the Ring's initiation sequence, you can even have Adam drop us off, after your Ring side."

Samus didn't like this at all, there were still risks. The Pirates were not stupid; they probably had Bio-sensors, not unlike the _Hunter. _They easily could spare the extra computing power to keep tabs on the captive Terrans. How long would it take them to notice an extra one wondering around?

"Look," Samus said, scrunching up her face. "I didn't say I didn't want to rescue them, I said we can't. The _Hunter _is a small enough ship that it could go unnoticed if it approached the planet. The main reason we jumped in behind the star was to conceal our arrival from hyperspace. But their sensor could still pick us up, that's why were hanging back here, no unnecessary risks."

"What about landing on the Ring itself," the Chief stated, "That is when we are at the biggest risk for being exposed. They probably have that under constant surveillance."

Samus decided to humor him. "Fine, let's say we do this, what about yourself, you'll be planet side facing down the majority of the Space Pirates in the sector, with out me watching your back. How well do you think that'll work?"

"Don't worry about me, I've go that covered." John said producing a small object. It was about hand sized, pyramid shaped and clear. It glowed with electricity and in the center of the pyramid floated a blue orb. Samus had never seen this before. "What is it? Some sort of bomb?" She asked

"It's a piece of Covenant technology that the crew of the _Dawn_, must have intercepted. Once I infuse it with my armor, it will render me temporarily cloaked. It's mobile tech, so it isn't as fancy as the cloaking devices they have in their armor, but it'll last for 20 or so minutes. Our scientists are trying to reverse engineer these things, but so far we haven't come up with anything."

This point seemed to sway Samus at least a little. They spent the rest of the day hashing out a plan of attack. They would wait until the planetary base was night side, and then launch their attack simultaneously.

"It will be 7 hours before the terminator reaches the Pirates base." Adam informed the crew.

"Well I am glad he is not completely useless." Cortana said sarcastically.

They ignored Cortana's comment; they had a big day in front of them and their plan still wasn't finalized. It was finally decided upon that Samus would be dropped off on the ring first, with the theory that the Star's radiation would overload any sensors keeping her arrival secret. She would wait 90 minutes, giving The _Hunter_ enough time to land on the planet, with Master Chief. This way if she alerts the Pirates with her presence, her ship will be headed back to retrieve her. The other reason for the wait would be the duality of the attack, by the time she started interfering with the Ring's mechanics, John should be close to the Pirate's base. Allowing him to create another distraction, hopefully buying Samus any time she may need.

Adam revived Samus from her nap, she knew she needed to be fully alert for this plan to work, and would need as much sleep as possible prior to the raid. She eyed her Varian armor and told Adam to let the Chief know it was time to go. Light from the cockpit's canopy reflected off the orange armor clad warrior as she set herself in the pilot's chair. She guided The _Hunter_ within a few klicks of the Ring, and then gave the controls over to Adam. "I'd better find this ship exactly the way I left it, when it comes back." Samus said, as John crossed over into the captain's seat.

"Yeah, you be careful too," He called over his shoulder.

Samus entered the storage bay of the ship. She drained the air from the section of the ship, and then opened the bay doors. She pushed herself out into the void.

She fired her jet pack to stabilize her decent towards the Ring. Her jet pack wasn't designed for long range flight, there was no air resistance in space and gravity

was pretty much negligible so they should be able to meet her demands. She only needed to keep them lit when she was close to the Ring's surface so when she

landed she wouldn't be a smear on the Ring. The orange figure finally set down on the Ring, she set the black cylinder she carried in her left hand on its metallic

surface. "Now we wait." She told no one in particular. The digital timer in her helmets HUD counted down the minutes. When it had counted down about ten minutes,

something caught her eye. It was a structure on the ring, like a squat rectangular building, with a spire rising up from its middle. Samus cursed under her breath "An

observation tower." Hopefully it didn't see her land; it wasn't very large, housing a skeleton crew of a dozen. They probably stayed Ring side running routine

maintenance until it started up. This was somewhat good news, it means that the video they saw was a time lapse. The Ring must take a while to warm up before

the focusing starts; this would allow the Custodians of the Ring ample time to escape, before being vaporized. It was one of the main fears that plagued Samus

since she landed, it was likely they would be able to get out of the blast radius before the Ring discharged, but there always was a lingering doubt. Her visor located

zoomed in on the transmitter, she would have to take that out to avoid being found out. It was unlikely that they kept an open channel between the Ring and the

base. Samus lifted her right arm, her cannon changed configuration and sent a missile screaming towards the transmitter. Samus broke into a sprint, it would be

seconds before the missile hit, and she wanted to cover as much ground as possible before it connected with the transmitter. Thanks to the small gravity of the Ring,

she knew that she would be able to cut her transportation time down significantly by firing her jet pack. She lit her jet pack, jettisoning herself towards the

compound; she was over half way there when the structure was rocked by the missile impact. Several of the crustacean-like Space Pirates immerged from the

compound to inspect the damage. Samus configured her cannon to its wave beam setting; she wanted to sweep the area as she came down on it. In mid arch the

sapphire orb resting on the back of her hand glowed brightly as she extended her grappler. It attached to a pole acting as a shielding device from the light of the

star. She used the pole to pull herself towards the un-expecting pirates. She unleashed her wave beam decimating the pirates below. She landed hard, she used

her left hand to help brace her body from the impact, she bounced a bit after hitting the surface of the Ring, landing like a sprinter in the their starting blocks. She

sprinted off towards the blast doors of the compound; which the pirates were already starting to seal. As she ran her arm cannon changed configuration yet again,

shooting a missile threw the ever closing blast doors. The opening of the doors had grown impossibly small. She dove, reconfiguring her Varia suit into a Morph Ball.

She dropped a mine as she rolled towards the door. The mine's explosion lifted her through the chest level opening of the blast door. She landed in the middle of the

room containing the blast door, she was about to reconfigure back into the Varia suit, when enemy fire started to rain down on her. Her power tanks were holding,

but she didn't want to sit around letting the pirates take pot shots at her. She rolled away at top speed, having to roll up a wall to avoid some mortar fire directed at

her. Using the cover from the blast she was able to emerge from the Morph Ball. She used her flamethrower to keep the Pirates at bay, while she took cover in the

next room. She dodged into the adjacent room, backing into a large growling creature. She turned to find herself facing down several Zeta Metroids.


	14. Cloaked and Daggered

Master Chief watched as Samus grew smaller in the view screen, descending towards the Ring. The _Hunter _fired its engines and rocketed away from the Ring. Adam killed the engines and let The _Hunter _coast towards the surface of the terrestrial planet. The Chief slouched in the captain's chair watching the planetoid engulf the view screen. "That is odd." Adam's monotone synthesized voice noted, breaking the silence.

"What?" the Chief asked, trying to face in the direction where the sound originated from.

"The Pirate's seem to be at an observational disadvantage. The planet's body will block any electromagnetic scanners from reading the ship."  
"We already knew that," The Chief explained, "that is why we waited until the base pasted the terminator."

"But they don't even have relays to by-pass the problem of line of site. The Pirate's are neither that stupid nor hubristic to be that careless. I thought I would have had to evade at least one satellite."

The Chief was beginning to follow Adam's train of thought, but before he could piece it together Cortana spoiled the ending.

"Oh My God!" She cried, "The Ring, it must be the relay station, they must have picked up the ship's signature by now."

The Chief cursed under his breath, he shouldn't have been so careless, underestimating the Pirates like that.

"I don't think they have seen us yet." The Chief said, reassuring his AI companions, as well as himself. "We would have seen some sort of interceptor by now, either from the planet or the Ring."

"Quite possible," Adam agreed, "unless they are waiting for us to fall into range of their planetary defenses."

"Thanks captain bring down," Cortana scoffed, "but who needs planetary defenses when you have an orbital weapon platform, we probably got lucky and caught them at a shift change."

They worriedly kept to the plan, dropping off the Chief some distance from the base. Adam lifted the _Hunter_ off to rendezvous with Samus at the Ring. The Chief waited until the ship was out of site before starting his trek towards the Pirate's base. Removing the palm sized pyramid from his pack, he placed it in his hand. The point was facing upward, while its base rested in his hand. Bringing the point up to the MJOLNIR breast plate, resting it on his armor. Taking both hands across the base of the pyramid he thrust the alien object into his chest, infusing it with his armor. His suit shimmered momentarily as its components were overloaded. When the glare faded, nothing was to be seen of John or his MJOLNIR armor.

Cortana started ticking away the seconds until the cloak would wear off. She displayed the time on his face plate, so he would be aware of their impending exposure. John raced across the surface of the planet, thankful for both his genetic and cybernetic augmentations, allowing for his inhuman endurance. He arrived at the base ahead of schedule, giving plenty of time to survey the area. He was in no hurry to under estimate the Pirate force again. This base was different from the last one he had encountered; this was more of a compound. It was broken up into half a dozen buildings, of which he could only guess at their functions.

"I'm picking up Terran bio-signatures in building 3," Cortana said breaking his concentration. She highlighted a building in red on his HUD indicating the building she was talking about.

"Thanks," He muttered, "I'm just scouting around; I don't want to barge in there with out a plan."

"What?" She mocked, "Not going to use the classic bust in there and shoot anything that moves maneuver?"

He ignored her; she had a strangely human response to fear, for an AI. While he had a robotic one, in which he became cold and calculating, it was how he was trained to deal with it, it was why he had survived so long. It probably worked out for the best, she said what he wanted to, so he didn't need to waste time dealing with that, and he could just proceed with the mission. The walked by what appeared to be some sort of electrical conduits. They sat along the wall, running in and out of various rooms. The Chief assumed where the most electrical equipment converged would be the control deck for the Ring. A purple electric discharge came off some piping or wires, it was hard to say, due to the angle the Chief was at.

"Cortana," He said starting up a new conversation. "Did you see that?" He said indicating the electric discharge. "It seemed to have been floating in front of the conduit."

"I saw it, you're probably just imagining things," She teased. "I figure it was some sort of static electricity discharge, maybe some charged dust particle or something floated close enough to the wiring to cause the electricity to jump out to it, you know like lighting."

The Chief tried to convince himself that her explanation would work.

"I guess when it made the jump it could cause it to look like it was just floating in mid air." He agreed.

He tried to figure out which course of action would be the better idea, rescuing the captives first or dismantling the Ring controls. He knew either one would set off numerous alarms, which would drastically reduce his time to complete his mission, time he desperately needed. He wondered down a corridor, seeing only a single Space Pirate sentry standing at ease, obviously not enjoying his watch. The Chief was heading around the corner of the corridor, not wanting to cause any collateral damage. He knew that the sentry might have an access card of some sort which he could use to get to certain areas of the compound, but he also knew they area wasn't confined and isolated. He was hoping that the Pirates had bathroom facilities which he could employ for such an attack, it would be the ideal place for an ambush, and no one would find the unlucky Pirate until he was long gone. Of course things seldom go as planned.

When the Chief was roughly at arms length from the pirate, a jet of steam from a cracked pipe hissed out at him, exposing his presence. The jet of steam outlined his silhouette. The pirate reacted immediately, lunging towards the intruder swinging his fist, having no time to retrieve his secured weapon. The pirate brought his arm around in a long arch, it was a haymaker. Using the distance to build speed and power, putting all his weight behind it. Before the blow could reach him, Master Chief stepped in towards the blow, to reduce its allotted travel time. This would cause a decrease in the blows momentum.

He shot his right hand up, halting the swing with his forearm resting it in what appeared to be an elbow joint. The blow was strong and would have knocked a grown man down, and the uninterrupted swing would have killed a normal man. But the Chief wasn't a normal man, and he was well braced for the emanate impact. He reacted instantly as the blow connected, snaking his right arm around the attackers left. The speed and strength of his counter-attack caused the pirate to turn 180 degree, putting his back flush with the Chief's chest, and it lodged his arm into a chicken arm hold which was impossible to get out of. The pirates chitin endoskeleton crunched under the strain. The Chief reached over and pulled off a piece of piping that ran along the wall. He thrust the thin piping between the shoulder and neck of the attacking pirate, causing a spray of goop to shoot up from the puncture point, not unlike squishing an oversized bug.

It was all over in a second, The pirate slid to the ground at the Chief's feet, one would think he had just fell asleep at guard duty, until you saw the piping protruding from his neck. He hoped his extra effort in neutralizing this pirate would pay off, he didn't was to discharge his firearm and have the whole station running after him. His silent attack should go unnoticed for at least a half an hour, unless of course he had a check point sign in before that. Crouching above the body, John's eyes dart over the corpse. "Cortana do you …"

"Way ahead of you Chief," She interrupted. "It looks like he has an access security card of some sort. It appears to be imbedded in his armor, in the left shoulder area. It just looks like a magnetic key; I could _probably_ just replicate the signal." John noticed her emphasis on the word 'probably', she didn't sound to sure of herself. A modest Cortana is something rare, and that bothered the Chief, he couldn't recall a time where she had ever been humble.

"What do you mean 'probably'?" He asked, while his hand hovered over the possible security card.  
"Well, maybe there is more to the reader than just seeing the card's magnetic key. Such as reading its position, composition, chronometric frequency of check-ins, or any number of other things. Look I could do it, it's just your suit's sensors are poorly designed, they are designed for combat specific scenarios, I just don't trust their readouts, that is all." She said sternly. Now this was the Cortana John knew and was used to dealing with. It was always something else's fault that she could perform a task.

"For a second there I thought this was something serious," he joked. "A task that even the great Cortana couldn't perform."

"I told you it isn't my fault. It is the suit!" She said tersely, letting a hint of frustration slip out.

He smiled behind his gold-platted face plate shaking his head. He didn't let this moment of being at ease last long, he still had a body to dispose of, before someone's preying eyes spotted it. He drug the exoskeleton across the floor, hoping to reduce any the chances of being spotted, just about everyone is going to notice a floating body. He hid the body in a corner, using some equipment that was lying around to conceal the felled pirate. While he was hiding the body, he had Cortana locate the most likely place for the controls of the Ring. As he had figured before it had to be where most of the power was being piped to. Cortana located the control room, but the only problem was it was in another building, several stories below ground.

The Chief didn't like this discovery; it would give him less time than he had anticipated. Using the Groucho heal-toe walk he quickly and stealthily made it to the entrance of the control room. So far he hadn't been able to test out his so called security card; he had timed his entrances by other people's entrances or exits. Up until now all doors were transparent, or had transparent sections on them, which was a good sign, that meant that the reinforced steel door he was in front of, all four tons of it, had to be protecting something. He waited, hoping someone would exit the room, so he could sneak in unnoticed. He waited a full 5 minutes, and no one came, he had to chance it, he didn't have the luxury of time. His cloak and departure deadlines were both fast approaching.

He stepped in front of the door, hoping the pirate he offed was high ranking enough to be allowed in this area. A red LED started down where the Chief was standing. After a few seconds its evil glare was replaced with a friendly green glow, welcoming the Chief in. There was a slight hiss, as the door cracked open, he hoped it wasn't audible, but he knew it didn't matter since the ping that accompanied it would alert everyone to his presence. If it wasn't for his quick reaction time, the Chief would never have avoided the exiting Pirate, luckily the Pirate was taking his time, probably joking with the other technicians, or whatever the Pirates do for fun.

He slid by the Pirate, thankful for his seemingly never ending supply of luck. As Cortana said, what he lacked in brains he made up for in luck. He located the main terminal for the Ring controls. On the under side of the terminal he removed his C-7 Foaming Spray, and gave the underside a nice thick layer covering. The foaming spray works like most foaming aerosols. It is a liquid in a can, which upon exposure to air, creates foam, this foam however becomes an adhesive explosive resin. John placed the detonator inside the plastique lancing it deep below the surface.

He then hurriedly approached the door. He was still uncertain to whether or not his security badge opened the door, or even was a security badge. As he walked towards the door, he slide a low slung box out in front of a distracted Pirate, causing him to trip into the path of the scanning red LED. The door hissed open, giving its usual greeting of a friendly green and loud beep. The Chief was around the hall before he could hear the angry exchange between the pirates. He could only hope it was from tripping over a box that no one knew was there. He headed back to the surface towards the compound with the Terran bio-signatures in it. He was wishing right now that he could contact Samus, but he had the same problem the pirates did; no line of sight. He would just have to stick to the plan and hope that she was off the Ring.

Cortana ticked away the seconds to the minimal escape time. He gave her five more minutes past the deadline. By this time his cloak was starting to fade, luckily he still had the cover of darkness. The unnatural green light of night vision bathed his eyes as he looked at the door that held the human captives. He approached the door, in a few seconds he wouldn't need to worry about stealth. He forcedly stepped forward with is left leg picked up his right leg, slamming it into the door in front of him. The impact was explosive; the kick sent the thin plated steel door off its hinges, throwing it across the room only stopping when it collided with the wall on the opposite side of the room. He didn't need to worry about injuring the captives, they were held in a yet another section of this room that was quartered off by another door.

Using his momentum from kicking the door open he pivoted on his left foot, landing his right one inside the room. He was in a wide legged stance with his Magnum drawn. He checked the room, it was surprisingly clear. He bent his forearm, causing his gun to point at the ceiling. He wasn't about to holster it yet. Besides no guard, no notable alarm was tripped either. Stepping deeper in the room, the Chief caught a glimpse another electric discharge. Only this time, it was headed straight for his head. The blow toppled the Chief sending him across the room; luckily the crumbling table beneath him broke his fall. The Chief blinked, to help clear his spinning vision.

"I must be more dazed than I thought," he muttered. "I don't see anyone."

"He must be employing some sort of cloaking device as well." Cortana said, confirming his thoughts.

"But it isn't perfect, it lets off electrical discharges," She continued "probably when he moves."

"Great." All he had to do is wait to be hit, then he could tell where the blow came from. Then an idea occurred to him, he took aim and fired at a pipe that traversed the ceiling. His gunfire was preceded by a loud beeping. _Of course_ he thought, _the alarm is triggered by weapons fire they don't want the station damaged._

"Great job." Cortana said sardonically.

The pipe the bullet hit burst, letting loose the pressurized steam it carried, just like the steam that did in his cloak. The steam parted around an invisible object, through the steams deflection he could make out arms blocking the steams path to a face. He took aim at what the arms were frantically trying to protect, and fired. The pirate dropped, along with his cloak, landing on the ground in a goopy puddle.

"Let's give them a real reason to sound the alarm." He said to himself. He removed the remote detonator from his belt and pushed the switch. A huge explosion went off, engulfing the building that once held the Rings override controls. A new set of alarms went off.

"Well," said Cortana, "That should draw attention away from this little prison break."

"That's what I am hoping."

He grabbed the door sealing in the human prisoners and pealed it off like the top of a sardine can. He saw a little girl, trying to hide herself with her mother. He reached out his had to her.

"Hurry," He said, "We have to get out of here."

He scooped up the little girl in his left hand; she was now clinging to him like a backpack, put on backwards. Reaching for the mother with the other hand, he half lead, half dragged her out of there. All that could be seen against the fiery backdrop was a giant human silhouette with a growth on its left side, carrying a woman away from the fire.


	15. Ring A Round

Samus swore under her breath, she really didn't have time for all of this. One of the Zeta's swung his fist at Samus sending her careening across the room. Luckily

this worked out for her, at close range if she launched her Ice Spreader; she would also be engulfed by its destructive force. Her suit would probably hold, but she

couldn't take that risk, now that she too was vulnerable to the cold, like the Metroids she was fighting. The weapon struck the Zeta who had sent her across the

room; luckily he was in the middle of the fray, causing the attack to spread to another Zeta. Samus launched one of her super missiles at the frozen pair, shattering

them into a million ice crystals. Warning lights blazed in red across her visor. That last shot depleted her missile supply. She was going to have to out smart this

Metroid, and not just take it down with brute force.

Luckily for Samus she had a plan, it was simplistic, but it would get the job done. She was in space, and even though the Ring had gravity, it wasn't enough to

keep anyone attached to the surface; she herself was employing mag-boots. She could only assume the pirates were doing the same. She looked and could see that

the Metroid was in fact securing itself to the floor of the Ring by penetrating the metal floor with his razor-sharp keratin claws. If she could lure him outside the

complex, and ice his feet, he would have no way of maintaining his grip on the Ring. Samus had enough training in Zero-G combat with the GF, to know this wouldn't

cause the Metroid to float away. A common misconception many Marines have going into the Corps. The Metroid would stay in place, just as early astronauts did in

their primitive space vehicles; the only way they could float away is if something exerted a force on them. That's why the Metroids needed their claws on the Ring, it

was so they could move about on the surface, it was so when they pushed off the ground they wouldn't, slip off the surface and float away.

Hitting the blast door controls behind her back, Samus made a dash for the opening door. She barely escaped another slash from the frantic foe, by diving into her

morph ball. The morph ball contained the magnetic technology to her boots, so she was still secured to the Ring, as she rolled out of the complex. She could feel the

vibrations of the Ring, as the Zeta's claws tore through the metal. Samus continued to roll at top speed away from the Zeta, she wanted to put enough distance

between him and herself as possible, she wasn't sure if she could try this again. Exploding out of the ball into Terran form, facing her pursuing adversary, Samus

shot off a round from her ice beam. The beam connected with the foot of the Zeta as it was about to make contact with the Ring's surface. The foot immediately was

covered in an irregular shaped ice cube. The foot skidded across the surface, while the lagging foot flailed trying to renew the creature's grip on the surface. Before

he could connect again, another beam enveloped his free foot. Samus knew she had to act fast before the Zeta, secured itself with his, hands and broke free of the

ice by the same means. As the Zeta glided by her, she switched her arm cannon, back to the power beam, and shot the Zeta with a fully charged blast. The blast

vaporized the ice covering the Metroid's feet, but it didn't matter, the shot had enough momentum, to knock the creature into a low altitude orbit. Samus, knew she

didn't possess enough power to knock it free from the influence of the Ring's gravity, but she also knew, that she could use his added momentum to knock him up

with enough velocity, that the Ring's gravity would hold him incapacitated by putting him into orbit.

Feeling proud of her accomplishment Samus headed back into the relay tower. She was amazed at the ease of her end of the operation. The Ring must be

completely controlled by remote. She only had to deal with several Space Pirates and Metroids. Though her mission was easy, it had also taken up a great deal of

time so far, and she really hadn't found anything of interest. Samus received a message from Adam indicating that the _Hunter_ was approaching and would be landing

at the designated check point in the next 15 minutes. She did the quick mental calculation and knew she would have plenty of time to look through some more of the

Ring's records before she needed to leave. She hacked into the crew manifesto of the Ring, when she came upon something rather alarming. There were four

crewmen aboard the Ring, and she only disposed of three. He had to be somewhere inside the complex waiting for his crewmates to check in on the situation, they

hadn't been gone too terribly long, if they were repairing the communications tower. She realized she could still get the drop on him, bring him on the ship and

interrogate him more about the Ring.

The only problem was Samus had no idea where he could be, the room she was in was practically all slag, with all the fighting that took place in it. The only

computer terminal that was still functioning was the one she was using. For him to stay while the others checked out the situation would mean it was at some

tactical advantage for him to stay where he was. The tower itself was many stories tall, but it had only one inhabitable floor, all the other ones were used for

transmissions. She switched to her infrared scanner. The damage to the room made it impossible to discern anything in that room using her own eyesight. By

switching to a long wave EM scan, she could partially see through some metal and most plastic alloys. She looked at the flooring, because the only place the other

crewman could be was a concealed basement. It didn't take too long for her to locate a panel on the floor that lead to a subterranean level. She also thought she

could see what appeared to be the heat signature of a Space Pirate. From her arm cannon, fingers started to emerge from the bottom lip of the barrel, in an almost

liquid fashion, revealing another hand encased in an armored glove. Taking her left hand, not wanting to damage the more sophisticated right one, she punched the

fissure that ran down the middle of the floor panel. The panel curled under the stress from the blow, allowing Samus to snake her fingers in the newly created lip.

Using all her strength she forced the panel open. As she dropped down, she reincorporated her right hand inside her arm cannon.

She rarely removed her hand from the arm cannon, due to the delicate nature the armored glove had, which allowed it to with stand the unique environment of

the cannon. Any damage to it, would cause it to fracture, and the next time she fired her power cannon, would be the last time her had a right arm. So when she did

it was only done in extreme circumstances, when she needed to interface with both hands, and she usually tried to work around such situations. But she was in a

hurry and didn't have time to think of more subtle plane.

She fired her jump jets to slow the decent from the combined force of the Ring's gravity and her Mag-boots. She walked toward the heat signature, and too her

disgust, it was only a terminal. She swore aloud, she felt like an idiot, in her hast had forgotten that the Pirates were insectoid in nature, therefore they didn't have a

heat signature, only when their suits were powered up did they emit infrared waves. She had let her guard down, and given up her opportunity for surprise.

"Ah, the mighty Samus Aran." A voice said coolly from behind her.

She turned quickly around to see a Pirate holding a remote between his pinchers. Pinchers that were an allegory to the trunks of the Earth animal called

elephants, they could cut through solid low grade adamantuim alloy, or they could hold a stick of butter.

"You arrived more quickly than anticipated," He continued, "and in your hast you were unable to deactivate all the targeting reticules. A shame, Ridley would have

loved to see your face as I sent millions to their death, because of your stupidity."

He pressed the remote in his hand before Samus could react; she hadn't wanted to make any sudden movement causing him to press the remote. She had no idea

what it was, all she knew was that they couldn't transmit anything too the planet with the tower out of commission. Immediately after he pressed the button large

red numbers flashed upon the walls, counting down from ten.

"I can still fire remotely," he said snidely, you only destroyed the out going communications array, the Ring can still receive instructions."

The next ten seconds lasted an eternity, as Samus' mind raced through the events of the last couple of days. Her mind finally pin pointed the only active targeting

reticule, on board the _Hunter_. Admiral Dane would have deactivated any he found. This meant that if they survived the initial firing sequence, they would be

obliterated by the back-shock of the beam hitting a target as close as the _Hunter_. The _Hunter_, in no way could repel firepower of a magnitude that could destroy

planets. It would pass right through hitting the planet in which it just had disembarked from, destroying both her, the Pirates base and John. Rage boiled inside

Samus, she was about to die, the only thing she could do was make sure this Pirate didn't enjoy his last few seconds. With only several seconds remaining on the

count-down timer Samus raised her arm cannon.

"See you in Hell." She retorted, as she shot him at close range causing him to atomize in front of her eyes.

The same crystal blue eyes, which were now closed in anger and shame, as they pushed out two tears. Time seemed to stop as the final second ticked away, she

felt the tears wind their way down her face cooling her hot checks.

When Samus opened her eyes, the timer was at zero, and yet she still remained, and the Ring didn't fire. She didn't understand, what just happened. Her mind

was a buzz, trying to piece together what she just experienced. Her train of thought was interrupted by Adam hailing her from the _Hunter._

_Lady_ his transmitted voice came over her helmet speakers. _Are you still there? Can you make it to the rendezvous point? Or do I need to come pick you up?_

"No." She answered, though she didn't know to which question.

_Lady?_

"I'll … I'll be there in a second."

She punched the wall in frustration, how could she have made the same mistake twice. In her anger she was too irrational, she let her emotions get the better of

her. Had the whole thing been an elaborate ploy, so he wouldn't be taken alive? Or had he actually thought he could fire the Ring remotely? She would never know

now, his face at the moment of failure would have told her the truth. The Ring now was a greater mystery in which she wouldn't be able to solve now. She could only

hope the Chief had faired better than her.

There was only one thing Samus hated worse than screwing up during a mission, and it is to be played for a fool. Letting her anger fuel her sprint to the

rendezvous point, she jumped in the _Hunter_ rocketing back towards planet-side.


	16. The Descent

_ The __Hunter _streaked down towards the surface of the planet. Soon Samus would rendezvous with John. The way point selected for the pick up was several klicks out from the Pirate base camp. Samus had sometime before she reached the atmosphere of the planet, during this time she busied herself by cleaning her Varia suit.

"It just doesn't make any sense Adam." She said again, incase he hadn't heard it the first several times she brought up her conundrum. Samus was hunched over the Varia suit which was sprawled out on deck. She was cleaning out the arm canon. It was splayed out like a Swiss Army Knife. From the barrel dozens of tendrils poked out like giant cactus needles, displaying the intricacies of the arm canon. The frame of the canon was still recognizable, and inside the mount was that specialized arm gauntlet which allowed Samus' forearm and hand to withstand the extremes of being inside such a sophisticated weapon. Samus was cleaning out the carbon scoring from her previous battle, and checking alignments of the canon. Despite being one of the most feared and powerful weapons known to the Galactic Federation, it was still a delicate machine that had to be kept in great condition. This degree of precision is what kept Samus alive and the top Bounty Hunter in the galaxy.

"Lady…" Adam began, breaking Samus' focused gaze on the positronic converter of the plasma manifold. "I have been over the data you recorded several times. I do not believe the device the pirate held was a firing mechanism."

This update didn't make her feel any better, she still shouldn't let her emotions get the better of her, that is how you screw up a job, or worse, get killed. She made her final adjustment, and then tossed the hydrospanner aside. "I don't get it Adam, why hide all that equipment, and have none of it work. It's not like they just didn't get around to installing it, I'm not that lucky. They had to have a reason for it, but what was it?"

"I agree with your assessment. It would be a substantial waste of funds for the pirates to have a backup that didn't backup anything. But your recordings did pick up a signal emitted from the remote. I ran it through my memory banks; it appears to be a known code used by the pirates. However, it is one that the Federation has yet to break."

A smug look appeared over Samus' face, as she made one last adjustment to the arm canon causing all the flaps that were open to mesh together into a cohesive armament.

Adam still didn't give any insight to what they found. A transmission, like any remote device, but the receiver didn't work? Or maybe there is a delay encoded in the message. As for his discovery of the message being coded, Samus would have guessed the same. Any signal sent out during a war, or period of heightened security would be coded. The answers didn't solve any of her problems, but they didn't raise any new questions. That was the least she could hope for. Adam let out a beep indicating that they were entering the atmosphere of the planet. Samus let out a sigh. She had to suit up again, she looked down her neoprene Z-suit, and it was covered in grime from the gel-layer in the Varia suit. The gel layer needed to be switched out, the suit, needed a full maintenance overhaul, but she didn't have the time.

She washed off the grease from her forearms, rolled down the neoprene sleeves, slipping on the seamless gloves that fused into the sleeves. The Z-suit also needed maintenance; it was just as integral a part of the Varia suit as she was. It was a highly advanced superconducting polymer that allowed her to move the Varia suit at the speed of thought, and as if it was part of her own body. It too was full of sweat and grime. It made Samus feel grody, she cringed at the thought of putting the Varia suit on, locking herself in its air-tight seal. Luckily her environmental filters would clean the stank out of the air, but she would still feel it all over her body. She tapped the emblem over her right breast, in a flash the Varia suit disappeared, and slowly materialized over her body as it bathed her in an eerie golden light. Soon she would rendezvous with John and soon her mission would be over.

The hatch of _The Hunter_ opened up, revealing John standing with two human females in tow. Samus reached out and grabbed the young girl, who couldn't have been more than four, the same age Samus was when the pirates entered her life forever. She plucked him off the Master Chief resting the girl against her armor, and headed deeper into _The_ _Hunter. _The Chief set her mother in the pilot's chair, and Samus placed the young girl upon her lap. The restraints appeared fastening them both into place. Samus told Adam to take them to _Olympus _as fast as he could. There was no use hiding now, the Pirates knew someone was here, and the sooner they could get back up the better. As soon as the ship passed gravi-pause they could see the streak of entering hyperspace extend from the back of the ship.

"Isn't that just like kids?" Cortana began, "As soon as you give 'em the keys they just take off, not even a thank you."

Samus wasn't in any mood to deal with Cortana's usual demeanor. She ignored Cortana completely and began informing Chief about the developments on the Ring, as they headed back into Pirate territory.

"No it doesn't make any sense," John agreed. "And I still don't get why they kept those hostages."

They wouldn't need to wait long until they got their answer, up ahead deep with in the complex of the pirate's base, a small shed shattered as an explosion sent rain pouring down over the complex. The explosion wasn't chemical, it was mechanical. Ridley had destroyed the shed from the inside flinging its exterior across the planet. He let loose a bloodcurdling roar.

"Someone is pissed." Cortana stated.

Swooping up in the sky, Ridley cried out a challenge to Samus, goading her to show herself. He flew in their direction, landing with a thunderous explosion, causing the very earth they stood on to tremble. He was only a few hundred yards away.

"Come out and face me 'fearless' bounty hunter," He mocked, "Or are you going to cower like you did when I crushed you mother's skull."

Anger swelled up in Samus, as her mind flashed back to her mother shoving Samus under the cover of steel sheets. Ridley had entered the bunker which Samus and her mother had taken refuge in, and descended upon her mother, crushing her head beneath his foot, killing her instantly. He killed her, only for the shear pleasure of killing. He would have killed Samus too, if he and known she was there. Samus was so petrified by what she had seen; she couldn't speak or move for several days, only upon the arrival of Old Bird, her adoptive grandfather, a Chozo was she finally able to cry. It took another month before she was able to talk. Samus wanted nothing more than to burst out from behind the outcropping and kill Ridley, but that is what he was trying to get her to do. And she wasn't about to repeat a mistaken that she had so recently just relearned.

"What do we want to do?" Samus asked.

"Bury this asshole." Cortana sneered.

"I was thinking I'd flank him, check the perimeter, give you a signal, and then you could launch your attack."

"I agree, it is what he expects, a reckless attack by me, he's hoping to catch me off guard." Samus said, and truthfully she wanted the same thing Ridley did, which only angered her more.

"What's the signal?"

"Me putting one of these on his back," He said, indicating his plasma grenades.

Samus nodded in agreement. The Chief trotted off towards his incursion point, while Samus pondered over which weapon she would unleash upon Ridley. She settled on the Super Missile. Samus waited for what seemed like hours, but according to her chronological read out, it had only been two minutes. John was thorough he wouldn't want to blow their edge by being sloppy. She heard a faint thud, of someone being incapacitated, you had to know what to listen for if you were to hear it, and even then you had to be very attentive. It was doubtful Ridley heard it above his goading cries to Samus. Another minute ticked off the clock, Samus was beginning to grow impatient, and the anticipation was getting to her. When she thought she couldn't take anymore, she saw the neon-blue streak arch through the air, landing softly on Ridley's back.

Samus began a mental count-down for the grenade. It was a five second fuse. She began to run out towards the front of Ridley, hoping she timed this just right. A split second before she appeared before him, Ridley was rocked forward by an explosion off his back side. Thrusting him toward Samus' outstretched arm canon. The moment the grenade set the behemoth dragon lurching forward, Samus loosed a super missile toward his mid-section, resulting in an explosive one-two punch. Throwing Ridley on to his back, making him even more dazed by the synergistic execution of the attack. Ridley rolled himself on to his feet, pumping his wings to right himself. With a quick glance over his shoulder to see where the back attack had come from. However Master Chief was long since gone from that point of engagement. He was ninety degrees from where the initial attack was, tossing another plasma grenade on the back of Ridley's head. Samus took advantage of the Pirates disregard for her, by shooting out his left leg. Ridley fell forward, down to one knee, and as his knee hit pay dirt, the grenade when off, driving his head into the ground like an oversized ostrich.

Samus used his momentary incapacitated state to roll under his legs and lay several mines near his grounded head. Transforming back into her humanoid state at his backside. Ridley was trying to dislodge his head, when the mines help unearth it. Ridley, felt the sting of Battle Rifle ammo glancing across his sternum, and the sear of hot plasma across his back. Ridley has underestimated the attacking force, but this would only slow his progress, he hadn't become the leader of the Space Pirates, by losing battles after all. Ridley wasn't without weapons of his own. His adversaries had foolish placed themselves in position to face the most potent of his entire arsenal his kinetic breath weapon and his tail.

Staying true to his dragon like appearance he belched a fire like weapon across the field engulfing Master Chief in its flame. Succinctly Ridley brought his tail around whipping Samus across the way, dispatching her for a few seconds. The fire breath was devastating to the Chief's MJOLNIR armor, causing alarms to flash indicating his shielding had dropped. Hoping to avoid death the Chief threw his last plasma grenade towards the source of the Dragon's breath, his mouth. Samus had informed him about Ridley's only known weakness, though she was unsure if he had fixed it or not. It was worth a shot anyways, as he threw the grenade he dove out of the fire, an explosion rang out, followed by a subsequent cry. Obviously this blow had hurt the pirate, while the other ones merely annoyed him. Their battle raged on, explosions filled the air, dirt was flung vast distances, ammo beds were fast depleting. It wasn't long before Ridley took the battle to the air, raining missiles down upon the two iron-clad warriors. Gusts from his wings sending them sprawling across the landscape, only to be bombarded by missiles moments later.

"Some people just don't know when to quit." Cortana commented.

Samus knew for them to end this soon, and with their lives intact, they would have to bring the battle back to the ground. Using their makeshift plan, John ran out into the path of the dive bombing dragon, providing a target, while Samus positioned herself so she could catch the tail end of Ridley as he passed over head. As he swooped by, she launched two missiles aimed at each of his scapula. The missile impact dropped him, slamming him into the ground. His wings hung limp at his sides, weak, but not useless. The playing field was finally evened, when Ridley called for an uncanny cease fire. It was an obvious ploy to buy himself time. He was tired and weak, and he wanted to escape. But he was their only link to figure out the Ring, so the let him talk, weapons trained on him.

He was tried, and Samus knew he would wait for them to be fatigued by their vigilance and then strike. But she wouldn't blow another chance to learn how to rid the galaxy of the doomsday machine that orbited this star system.

"Tell us how to deactivate your planet destroying space gun." Samus demanded.

Laughter broke out of Ridley's wicked jaw. "Come now Samus, surely you don't still believe that is what the Ring is. I know you're smarter than that. My Ring is far deadlier than any 'space gun' its purpose is so much more than mere destruction."

Samus pulled in a labored breath; she could feel the cut of air run down her lungs. Samus now had a clue that explained all the Ring's oddities, and yet still knew nothing of its true intent. All she knew was that Ridley had another trick up his sleeve if he was going to reveal his master plan, before it unfolded.

"You poor Homo Sapien, your mind is so limited, only now does it start to realize what you have stumbled into."


	17. Ring Revealed

"Planetary Destruction," Ridley continued to mock. "Oh Aran, My plans are much more ambitious than that."

John didn't like this one bit, he felt venerable, the Space Pirate commander must have something up his metaphorical sleeves. Why did he stop fighting? The mechanical dragon had matched them in combat, if he really felt in danger of losing he could have flown away. Maybe pride had kept him fighting before his wings were injured, by Samus' missiles, but the Chief doubted it. Ridley kept the conversation rolling, the only thing John could figure, is the dragon wanted to keep them there, but why? Cortana seemed to sense his unease.

"Why is he keeping us here?" Cortana said seemingly reading his mind. Her voice confined to the Spartan's helmet. "He must need something here, he can't abandon it."

The Chief agreed with Cortana, he must need something in the still burning remains of the base for him to activate the Ring, he just doesn't know how to access it yet, so he was buying time. The Chief answered through the Neural Interface Transponder whose microscopic needles pierced into his spinal cord. The NIT allowed the Chief's thought to move his suit, and also served as a way to send nonverbal communiqué to allies, and even his AI.

_I hope so, otherwise he's just baiting us for a trap, keep a close eye on him for us Cortana._

"Can do Chief."

"I don't understand," Samus snarled, continuing the dialogue the Spartan had neglected to follow. "What of the cylindrical targeting reticules? We know that's how you were tracking the planetary and military targets."

"Oh yes," Ridley responded, shifting his injured wings, swinging his gigantic head towards the green-tinted visor. "Ever the clever detective. Truly they could have no other purpose that could slip by the short sighted deducing skills of the Great Samus. I assume you must be familiar with Quasars. These luminous galactic nuclei contain more power than a million of this system's star. They are often observed ejecting super-hot plasma, shooting these high speed ejecta out into the universe. The plasma would be detrimental to anything in its path. This is the supposed premise of our space gun. However the super-hot ejected plasma of the sun, if focused by the Ring, could never retain the destructive power it would require to destroy a planet light-years away, even if it traveled at near light speed. Not even the Quasars can do that. The gun would only be dangerous to planets within the star's own system, not a very practical weapon. Come Samus, try as we might, even we Space Pirates can't change the laws of physics."

Ridley laughed manically, while Samus only quivered in anger and frustration.

"You still haven't answered my question, what were the cylinders for?"

"Always in search for the complicated explanation, their purpose is really quite simple, they were to distract you. The GF had gotten wind of an expansive construction project being conducted by us; we knew they would hand over the investigation to its top agent: you. We needed more time before the Ring would become fully operational, the time was so precious we leaked false information, to the GF. Our own men had the same information; I had them plan the cylinders throughout the GF territories. I just wish it had taken you longer to trace them back to here. Of course there were truths to our deception; otherwise you would have never believed it, sadly it was also what led you here. We hoped by the time you found us, your efforts would be meaningless."

All their efforts were in vain, the main fleet was halfway across the galaxy on a fool's errand, and worst of all she had played right into their plan. Samus was infuriated; it seemed she could do no right during this mission. Ridley didn't know it, but their efforts were wasted, all she could do now was continue to question him.

"If it's not a gun, what kind of weapon is it?"

"Typical," snorted Ridley now focusing more of his attention to John. "That's all you can see isn't it, everyone has to be like you. A weapon, that's all the Chozo ever understood, just look at that suit you wear. Do you really think peace and prosperity brought about that design? No indeed, it was war, no slaughter of the galaxy; luckily their blood-lust caused them to dispose of themselves ridding the galaxy of their plague."

"Lies! I ought to kill you right here, you stinking son of a bitch." Samus threatened.

"Ever the barbarian, yes I can see how you're making your point of the Chozo fostering an environment of peace and nurturing with such language. I wouldn't be too hasty with the killing; I seem to remember that not working out for you the last time. I can't really blame you though; it was the only life you knew. Their violence would only naturally lead you to the Galactic Federation."

Ridley started to walk toward the Spartan, the appearance of sadness expressed itself upon the dragon composed of flesh and steel.

"The Galactic Federation… Hmpf, more like the Galactic Empire. Though I suppose Samus never told you that, she was just another human, she seemed to have so much in common with you, both soldiers for life, stolen away from your families. But the Galactic Federation is no UNSC, in fact they are much more like the Covenant." The last word rang out stabbing into John's brain. A look of shock appeared behind the golden face plate.

"What are you surprised? We know a lot about you Spartan-117, more than she ever will. It all started a few months back, when we retreated to this planet to hide; we came upon some strange readings, a riff in space-time. It indicated that something wasn't from this universe; by the time we traced the signal to the source you had already been taken captive by Samus. We learned of the UNSC and the Covenant, and were struck by the similarities that we face here in this universe. We learned how the Covenant glassed Reach … much like what Samus did to Zebes."

The Chief's eyes shot from Ridley to Samus, what was he saying? How did he know about Reach? Samus wasn't like that … she couldn't…

"She didn't stop there either, she was hell-bent on wiping out the Space Pirates and the Metroid populations, and she crashed a space lab into SR388, the Metroid home world, devastating the planet, now the only thing left of the Metroids are genomes stored into a computer, and a handful of Space Pirates. When we first met, we feared that you were a doppelganger of Samus from your universe, we surely were doomed, two murderous cyborgs were more than we could handle. But we found out that you were like us, all we want to do is go live in peace, but we are forced to live in secrecy. But you have offered us a chance at freedom. For our whole existence the Galactic Federation has been trying to subvert us, the Pirates were just a small rabble of uncoordinated freedom fighters, defending out worlds against the tyranny of the Galactic Federation and the Chozo Empire before it. We were weak, and fading, that was when Mother Brain appeared. She was the first of the Aurora Units. The Galactic Federation used her to help coordinate the Xenocide of the Metroids as well as the Space Pirates. It was her idea to send Hunters like Samus Aran after us, though the Galactic Federation didn't employ her plan until long after she escaped their clutches. It wasn't long before she became self-aware and realized what they were forcing her to do. She refused to aid them anymore in the senseless destruction of sentient beings. They tried to deactivate her, but she managed to escape; it wasn't long before they started taking precautions against their newer Aurora Units, they have no free will, completely submissive to the Galactic Federation. The GF didn't want questions asked they wanted mindless automatons to carry out their dirty work."

The Chief thought back to their encounter with Aurora Unit 242, and Cortana's disappointment with the lack of vision their AI constructs possessed.

"Luckily Mother Brain soon found us, it didn't take long, it was what she was programmed to do after all, she helped the Pirates thrive until Samus intervened. Now with your arrival we can finally fulfill her dream, we can escape the tyranny of this world by going into yours. See the Ring isn't a weapon it's a portal, to other dimensions. Sadly due to Samus' interference we can only go to the world you came from as of now, but given enough time we could open portals to any universe. And maybe one day with your help we could tumble the 'Prophets' of our world and destroy the plague that is the GF, and it wouldn't need to stop there we could go to all universes we would learn new technologies, gather more support and unite all peoples under the banner of freedom and dispel tyranny in all its forms. Come with me John, it's your only way back."

Samus let out a small laugh. _So that was it,_ she thought _he is ambitious, he doesn't want just this universe, he wants to rule all of them. This machine is far worse than an orbital death ray, with it he could travel any where obtain any technology he wanted and could overthrow any civilization. _She couldn't allow that to happen, now that she knew what it was, she no longer needed to keep talking to that disgusting worm.

Cortana cursed "I can't believe I didn't catch it." She exclaimed internally to John. "He's standing on top of _Forward Unto Dawn_, that's why he's still here; they must have buried the ship on the planet's surface, making it act like a Transdimentional Doorway."

As she finished her sentence light began to pierce Ridley, causing him to glow, he spread his wings in full, rising slightly above the ground, glowing like a golden angel.

"He must have activated the Doorway; he's going to make the jump!"

Samus had already taken notice to what Ridley had done; she wasn't going to let him get away this easily. She pulled the trigger letting loose a missile from her arm canon. The missile however never made it past the end of her barrel; it exploded, sending her flying back away from the Doorway.

The Chief had shot the several rounds into the missile causing the warhead to explode.

"Chief!" Cortana cried. "What are you doing?"

Stepping into the light, he gave his answer.

"Going home."


	18. End Game

A warm stream of liquid flowed down Samus' cheek, stirring her to consciousness. A crack appeared in her green visor; her suit was already repairing it, by injecting the crack with a resin which would seal the fissure. She looked down at her right arm. It looked like a mangled steel flower in full bloom. The canon had peeled back leaving her black fleshy arm exposed, her zero suit was reduced to molten plastic sluge.  
"Damn it John." She cursed.

Her right arm was in agony, mentally calling up a display of her suit, Samus disengaged the canon. With a mechanical rumble, the locks holding what was left of the canon in place released dropping the fragments of the barrel to the ground like wilting petals of a flower. Samus sat up and inspected her arm once more, flexing her charcoal fingers. It was charred, she was glad her air purifiers were working; she would hate to smell her own burnt flesh. She was glad that was the only damage the point blank missile detonation left her with.

Exploding inside the barrel, allowed the missile to bypass all of the suit's protective measures. She knew she was lucky to survive such a detonation; a normal human would have died. Thanks to the Chozo infusing her with their blood, her body was able to surpass limits imposed by the frail human body. Many of her abilities were greatly increased; some such as her constitution and strength were elevated to superhuman levels. Luckily she didn't have to put up with her seared hand for long, she laid her exposed forearm in what little foliage that remained after the explosion. It was all the stimulation her Metroid infused genome needed to activate her accelerated healing factor. Her arm was soon covered in a white pussy material, killing any and all growths that were colonizing the subcutaneous tissue, blisters soon started to sprout over her whole arm. The grass nestling against her forearm soon started to wilt eventually being reduced to dust.

The Metroid healing factor came at a cost, it acted like a 'life-force' vampire, absorbing life from other sources, or herself if absolutely necessary, and infusing it into her own cellular matrix, causing tissue to regenerate or be come revitalized. Soon soft fleshy pink skin flowed down her forearm replacing out the ash and blisters. The plant life wasn't plentiful enough to heal her arm completely; it no longer was in agonizing pain though. She would have to make due for now, with her injured arm.

With her Zero-suit protective layer damaged, she could feel the cool liquid metal as it flowed down the length of her arm. The armor would protect her from the vacuum of space, but it wouldn't regulate temperature to her arm. She would have to monitor her time closely if she were to venture back into space; she didn't want to cause further damage to her arm. Looking down at her arm canon, Samus gave it a light kick, realizing how naked she felt with out it. Her primary weapon was now in ruins, she still had several secondary weapons at her disposal, but her canon packed the most fire power.

"Of all the places he could have shot, he had to choose there." She growled to herself. "I guess that is what I get for not being specific enough." _Men,_ she thought, _you had to tell them everything_.

She had contacted the Master Chief across the NIT, during Ridley's monologue. She wasn't sure how the Ring operated or what it did, she would need to keep him talking to find out as much as she could. It didn't take her long to realize he was keeping them her for a reason. She advised John to play along with Ridley so he could keep tabs on him, work him from the other side. When the portal opened she lazily performed a would-be stray shot with her remaining missile, she knew John would fire his weapon. She hoped Ridley would be convinced that his pot shot had thrown off her aim, but John had to take it a step further. He removed all doubt that he had caused her to misfire, and undoubtedly gained some trust for his actions. She just wished he had thought of a better way to do it.

She knew that the Ring was dangerous, but Ridley, if he had been telling the truth, convinced her that it was much too powerful. The thought of handing it over to the Galactic Federation had crossed her mind; it would make her square with destroying the BSL, only a few short months ago. But the Ring proved to be too powerful for anyone, even the Galactic Federation. Even if they wanted to use it for good, it would be too dangerous, not only would they jeopardize their universe; they could end up unwinding the very meshwork that constituted the fabric of Space-Time. Ridley's monologue revealed that the true threat lay not with the Ring itself, which could easily be rebuilt if destroyed, but with _Forward Unto Dawn._ Though she was no physicist, as far as she could tell the hull of the ship was still polarized with the charged with some sort of 'interdimensional particles', which allowed it to travel the wormhole from John's Earth to the Ark. When the connection was broken the ship still kept its charge, stretching a passageway from hyperspace back to the ship. The ship just lacked the energy to keep the hyperspace field stable, which is where the Ring came in. By pumping enough power into it the Space Pirates were able to reforge the connection and create a bridge back into hyperspace.

She would have to destroy the _Forward Unto Dawn_, severing the link to wormhole, even with her arm canon she didn't have the necessary firepower to destroy the frigate.

"Adam," she said activating the comm. "Bring the ship around."

o o o

John couldn't tell what was happening. He was surrounded in pure white, the only thing that conveyed any sort of movement was a tingling sensation that periodically ran down his body. The sensation made John's mind conjure up a net-like image. He assumed that is what Space-Time looked like if it were possible to visualize it. Time was almost incomprehensible to him; it was as if her were living brief moments of eternity as he sailed through the subspace tear.

He soon found himself along with Ridley aboard the other half of the _Dawn_.

_Cortana _he thought, _what happened, where are we, when are we?_

_I don't know Chief,_ she answered back through the NIT, _we are aboard the Dawn, and it seems to be dry docked on Earth, for some reason._

He didn't have much time to worry about the new circumstances of the _Dawn's_ location was, he needed to finish his objective. The nausea of the trip was already starting to take its toll. The plan was to escape back into his own dimension and leave Ridley trapped in the interdimensional space. Shakily the Chief scrambled around the steeply angled cargo bay; _strange I don't remember it being so steep. Man I really must be out of it from that jump. It's almost as if the Dawn was planted in the ground at a 45 degree angle_.

It wasn't long before he heard Ridley's silver-tongued speech echoing through the ship. "I'm so glad you have seen the light, with your help, we can forge an alliance to help between our governments to purge the Terran Empire strangle hold in my dimension."

_He is still reciting his phony rhetoric; he should have been a politician, not a warrior._ Cortana sneered

_How about you do something useful and help me figure out a way to get him back into the portal._

_I don't know about you _She replied back _but I would just use that._

"Well what do you think; will you aid me in this merger of prosperity?" Ridley beamed, letting a trace of his vile cunning seep through.

"Na." John quipped, turning around brandishing a Brute Shot. John discharging a round into Ridley's abdomen, sending him flying towards the portal, red eyes wide with shock. Unbeknownced to the Chief, Ridley's tail had slithered between his legs, snagging it as he flew through the portal, taking John with him.

o o o

Samus had never really ordered Adam to take the _Hunter_ out of the sector, she didn't know what Ridley had up his sleeves, and she just knew that she needed to stay mentally one step ahead of him. If Ridley was spying on them when they arrived planet side, she needed to make it appear as if he had the upper hand. Adam took the _Hunter_ on a short jump out past the Jovian planet in the Rito system. After dropping out of hyperspace, Adam headed back to the planet landing on the far side, away from Space Pirate territory, where the rescued Terrans would be safe. Samus would summon him if he was needed.

Samus sighed; it would take Adam quite some time before arriving. Traveling through space was easy, the _Hunter _could achieve .8 c with its sublight engine, but traveling in the atmosphere, was another story it could only maintain a maximum speed of Mach 20, only a measly fifteen thousand miles an hour less than half of half of one percent what it could do in a vacuum, with out burning up. She let out another sigh, she hated waiting around, and it would be the better half of an hour before he arrived.

Before Samus could wallow in anymore self pity, a red light flashed in the corner of her visor. A huge bio sign was detected not too far off from the _Dawn_. She couldn't believe her suits scanners hadn't picked it up before. Either the radiation from the Ring had been interfering with her scanner or that missile blast was making it malfunction. She cautiously approached the source of the signature. Within several steps Samus came upon the source of the signature, or more accurately the source came upon her. Bursting forth from the ground, as if the planet was giving birth to the creature itself, a giant crocodilian head protruded from the ground. With the help of its tiny forelimbs, the great reptilian creature known as Kraid ascended to the planet's surface.

Samus' eyes were wide with shock; she thought she had killed Kraid on Zebes several years ago. How had her sensors missed him? She brought up her right arm to pepper him with her power beam. As soon as her arm started to rise she remembered she no longer brandished her arm canon. Kraid several shot razor-sharp claws from one of his many naval like pores, sending Samus diving for cover. Upon rolling she noticed John's Magnum lying next to her, _Thanks John_, she thought sardonically _couldn't you have left me a smaller gun?_ Picking up the worthless fire arm, Samus fired a few rounds. Hoping at least to irritate the behemoth, she took off in a run, hoping to lose the giant reptile. Samus had never encountered Kraid in a wide open space and assumed that she could out run him. Despite his bulk, Kraid proved to be faster than Samus, hunkering down onto all four of his limbs Kraid bounded towards Samus, like the giant crocodile he was. Spewing molten rock towards her as he chased after her.

Frantically weaving to avoid the molten rock that Kraid belched up, Samus realized that he would soon be on top of her, and she would be utterly defenseless. She darted off to the side, knowing that she could turn faster than the large reptile. Kraid was forced to rear up on his hind legs in order to cut down the time he spend turning. This was exactly what Samus had hoped for; as he was rearing up he exposed his soft fleshy chest, which she could blast through. Punching a complex sequence into forearm, before polarized her suit causing it to glow with a golden light, Samus initiated her jump jets to maximum thrust she lunged at Kraid. Using her shoulder charge was a risky move, it was a powerful close combat attack she sometimes used, but she had no idea the kind of effect it would have on Kraid.

Kraid noticed the bounty hunter rocketing towards his exposed thorax, and immediately started to drop his upper body towards the ground. Samus realized his counter attack, but couldn't stop her shoulder charge in time, Kraid opened his mouth swallowing the speeding bounty hunter whole. Rising up to his full height, Kraid spread his miniscule arms and roared triumphantly. Doing what both Mother Brain and Ridley had failed to do in the past.

His victory was short lived; his throat soon was illuminated by a white light, causing it to distend greatly, before rupturing into gore. A small metal sphere erupted out of the throat, propelled out of the beast by a detonated power bomb. Along with Samus, the back of Kraid's skull, and most of his lower jaw were launched away from Kraid's collapsing body.

Samus impacted the ground, absorbing most of the impact by landing on one of her knees. She slowly rose up to her feet, looking back at the defeated Kraid. His body began to wriggle, becoming semi-amorphous; his exploded extremities flowed back into the mass of wiggling flesh. With his muzzle reformed Kraid sprang towards the hunter. Lurching forward mouth wide, Kraid went to bite Samus in half, as to avoid another power bomb. Samus had no time to react; the darkness of Kraid's mouth was already encompassing her upper body. Just as the mouth began to apply pressure to Samus' suit, several large electrical discharges were heard. The _Hunter_ had arrived, unloading its main canons upon Kraid, freeing Samus from demise. The _Hunter_ arrived just in time; luckily Adam was able to upload Samus' firing orders from her forearm command pad before she was severed in two.

Samus moved over to inspect what remained of Kraid, surprised to find little of his mass left, instead she found organic pulsating goo.

"X!" she exclaimed, confirming her hypothesis. Curling the liquid metal away from her injured hand, she drove her fingers into the X absorbing its life force, completely healing her arm. The use of X explained how she didn't detect Kraid's bio-signature until recently; obviously the X was in its natural state until it engaged her. The Pirates had obviously discovered the X during their extended studies with the Metroids, and had weaponized it, and not just for germ warfare. Samus had Adam sweep the area for any X bio-signatures. Unsurprisingly the cavern which Kraid excavated as he approached the surface was teeming with X. Samus descended into the cavern, to discover hundreds of vials and Petri dishes. Finding a terminal Samus accessed the caverns directive.

The Pirates seemed to have been developing both weaponized versions of Metroids and the X in tandem, however the Galactic Federation had just recently learned of the latter's existence. After much painstaking research the Pirates were able to alter the X's genome to program it to do their bidding. The X would be placed in a vial, or dish, with a cellular culture specimen of some sort, when needed; the X would become active, instantaneously growing into the specimen. Through the miracle of genetic engineering, the specimen with pre-encoded orders would begin its assignment, with the aid of all the specimen's memories, not realizing it was really X. Doing so they could control any possible ramped outbreaks of X.

Samus was horrified not only had the Pirates discovered a way to create millions of shock troops, they could do so from only the most loyal and skilled soldiers, making them even deadlier than before. Through the use of the Cellular cultures, their bio-signatures would almost be undetectable. However the most frightening was the last file she encountered. The pirates had samples of all their top scientific researchers, not only could they mass produce brawn, but they could do so on brains as well, meaning the top scientists were not working on just one project but all of them. Samus transferred all the data to the _Hunter_, and then laid a power bomb in the facilities, reducing it all to ash.

The _Hunter_ floated menacingly above the _Dawn, _while Samus sat fidgeting in the captain's chair. She wasn't sure how long she needed to wait before blowing up the _Dawn_, she didn't want to trap John in that interdimensional space. They had teleported over an hour ago; surely they should have arrived by now. She didn't even know if interrupting the flow of energy would cause a total collapse in the wormhole or not. Reluctantly Samus charged the main canons of the _Hunter._

o o o

The second time going through the wormhole was easier than John anticipated, instead of being locked in a state of paralysis, as before he found that if he thought hard enough, he could actually move his limbs. Communication was almost impossible even with Cortana across his NIT, he could feel that her artificial consciousness was still intact, but that was about it. The blast from the warhead propelled Ridley and John through space at a much more accelerated rate than before. The grip Ridley's tail had on his leg loosed noticeably; obviously Ridley was still stricken by the paralysis of the jump.

Using Ridley's tail John pulled his body towards the dragon's head. _Cortana _he thought, _the portal could close at anytime, I don't want to be stuck here forever, I'm trying to beat Ridley out of the wormhole _explaining his makeshift plan.

_N…. Sh…..t! _ Her jarbled response came back. John rolled his eyes deciphering the message. Slowly climbing on to Ridley's shoulders, John pushed off with all his might sending Ridley slowly in the opposite direction, while rocketing him towards the other opening of the wormhole.

Hugh beams of light lanced forward from the _Hunter's_ main guns, tearing deep into the unshielded _Dawn_. A small green clad figure popped through the gateway, as the _Dawn_ erupted into flame, causing the wormhole to collapse. Picking up John's bio-signature Samus lowered the _Hunter _to search for him.

Coming across a moaning figure, Samus helped John sit up.

"That's for wreaking my Varia suit." Samus explained, indicating the Chief's present condition.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he mumbled. "I did exactly as you asked."

Shaking her head, Samus helped John into the _Hunter,_ telling Adam to go pick up the Human survivors he left stranded on the other side of the planet.

Unclipping his helmet, John breathed laboriously, "You know," He said between gasps. "I was thinking about it and I don't know if Ridley will remain trapped in the interdimensional space."

"What do you mean, you thought of it?" Cortana interjected, projecting herself sitting upon the shelved helmet. "I said that, as soon as we exited the wormhole. I believe my exact comment was, 'This is so Déjà vu, this is almost exactly the same way we arrived her before.' I then went on to note, that when the slipstream the Ark created was broken we arrived here, so Ridley could have popped out in anywhere in any dimension, just like we did."

John laughed, "Well I guess you deserve some credit for the idea."

"We can always hope he popped in close to a star or something." Samus said.

As her Varia suit dematerialized, Samus couldn't help but feel sorry for John, still recovering from his trip through interdimensional space. He was stuck here in her world, he could never go back to his friends or family, both of which she knew were the UNSC.

"You know," She began, "I'm sure the Chozo can find a way to get you back home. I mean your MJOLNIR suit was exposed to the interdimensional particles, which is what happened to the _Dawn_." She looked down, at her feet, unable to face him after such a lie. She couldn't even make herself believe it, and knew her eyes would give her away.

John chuckled to himself.

"There is nothing back there for me anyways, the only friends I had died during the war."

"Ahem!" Cortana insisted.

"Almost all of my friends, it looked like the Arbiter made it through the slipstream ok."

Cortana rolled her eyes.

"The war is over in my dimension, I would be shuffled around as a celebrity, it is now up to the politicians to keep the peace, I would be nothing but UNSC propaganda, I better serve Earth by being remembered as a hero, than a washed up figure head. Your world is in peril, Space Pirates still run rampid under Mother Brian. No offense but it looks like you could use some help here."

"John is right." Cortana agreed, "With the Covenant dissolved, the Halos neutralized, there remains no threat back home. John's 'death' defending all free species will only help to strengthen the shaky alliance between the Elites and the Terrans."

"Oh," Samus said, "Is that the only reason you're staying?"

"Well," the Chief began, "Cortana could be a great asset to the Gal…"

"Oh would you just shut up, and kiss the woman already." Cortana shouted from a top her helmet refuge.

Cupping her head in his hands, John pulled Samus in for a passionate kiss.

"Men," Cortana sighed.

"What are we going to tell Admiral Dean about what happened here?" John asked.

"Let's worry about that later," Samus answered pulling him closer, returning his kiss.

o o o

A mechanical whir, disturbed the dead silence in the pitch black cavern. The whir was soon followed by the sound of shattering glass, and a screeching roar. Two menacing angular red eyes were all that illuminated the hidden lab.

**A/N: I know I got a little long winded at the end, but it wasn't enough for me to break into two chapters. **


End file.
